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Fisher, George Pa 
1909. : eee 


Paistche and rationalism 


Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2022 with funding from 
Princeton Theological Seminary Library 


httos://archive.org/details/faithrationalismOOfish_0 


FAITH AND RATIONALISM., 


BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 


THE SUPERNATURAL ORIGIN OF CHRISTIAN- : 


ITY, with Special Reference to the Theories of Renan, 
Strauss, and the Tubingen School. New and greatly 
enlarged edition. One vol., 8vo., cloth, ee $3.00 


DISCUSSIONS IN HISTORY we Bees ise 
One vol., 8vo., cloth, yin Bs Tes OONe 


THE REFORMATION. One vol., 8vo., cloth, $2.50 


THE BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIANITY, with a 
view of the State of cts Roman Migrie at aS Birth of 
Christ. S8vo., >< ave e's 00, 


THE GROUNDS OF COU es AND CHRISTIAN 
BELIEF. 8vo., wa tar Se RAS 


(enl= EN fo Ace 2 I2mo., paper, -30 
Clothes. 5 4 oo eAO 


*,* Sent eeu on fecaipt of price by the publishers, 
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS, 
743 & 745 Broadway, New York. 


FAITH AND RATIONALISM 


WITH 


SHORT SUPPLEMENTARY ESSAYS ON 
RELATED TOPICS 


BY 


GEORGE P. FISHER, D.D., LL.D. 


PROFESSOR OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY IN YALE COLLEGE 


If any man will [i. e., willeth to] do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, 
whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself. JoHNn vu. 17, 


NEW AND ENLARGED EDITION. 


NEW YORK 
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 
1885 


‘ 
~ 
4 


PHILADELPHIA 


GRANT & FAIRES — 


BY CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 


COPYRIGHT, 1879, 1885, 


is s 2 ‘ A i ; ers 
Wuxixos 5€ avOpwros ov SéxeTat Ta TOU mvEevmaTos TOU Beod. pwpla yap a’TYe 
€oTt, kal ov dvvaTat yv@vat, OTL mVEVMATLKaS avakpiveTat.—l Cor. ii. 14. 


“Howbeit, if we will truly consider it, it is more worthy to believe than 
to know as we now know. For in knowledge man’s mind suffers fiom sense 
which is the reflection of things material—but in faith the spirit suffers from 
spirit which is a worthier agent. Otherwise itis in the state of men glori- 
fied, forthenfaith shall cease, and we shall know even as we are known.” 
*RE ERK KK 

“The use of human reason in matters of religion is of two sorts; the for- 
mer in the explanation of the mystery, the latter in the inferences derived 
from it. With regard to the explanation of the mysteries, we see that God 
vouchsafes to descend to the weakness of our apprehension, by so express- 
' ing His mysteries that they may be most sensible tous; and by grafting 
His revelations upon the notions and conceptions of our reason; and by ap- 
plying His inspirations to open our understandings, as the form of the key 
to the ward of the lock. But here we ought by no means to be wanting to 
ourselves; for as God uses the help of our reason to illuminate us, so should 
we likewise turn it every way, that we may be more capable of receiving and 
understanding His mysteries; provided only that the mind be enlarged, ac- 
cording to its capacity, to the grandeur of the mysteries, and not the mys- 
teries contracted to the narrowness of the mind.” * * * * * * * 

“But as the use of the human reason in things divine is of two kinds, so 
likewise in the use are two kinds of excess; the one when it inquires too 
curiously into the manner of the mystery; the other when the same autho- 
rity is attached to inferences as to principles. * * * * * * * Wherefore it 
appears to me that it would be of especial use and benefit if a temperate and 
careful treatise were instituted, which, as a kind of divine logic, should lay 
down proper precepts touching the use of human reason in theology. For 
it would act as an opiate, not only to lull to sleep the vanity of curious spe- 
culations, wherewith sometimes the schools labor, but also in some degree 
to assuage the fury of controversies, wherewith the Church is troubled. 
Such a treatise I reckon among the things deficient; and call it Sophron, or 
The Legitimate Use of Human Reason in Divine Subjects.” —Bacon, De Augmen- 
tis, b. ix. 


“Je sais qu’ il a voulu qu’ elles”—les vérités divines—“entrent du coour 
dans I’ esprit, et non pas de I’ esprit dans le cceur, pour humilier cette su- 
perbe puissance du raisonnement qui prétend devoir étre juge des choses 
que la volonté choisit; et pour guérir cette volonté infirme, qui s’ est cor- 
rumpue par ses sales attachements. Et de la vient qu’ au lieu qu’ en par- 
lant des choses humaines on dit qu’ il faut les connaitre avant que de les 
aimer, ce quia passé en proverbe [ignoti nulla cupido]: les saints au con- 
traire disent en parlant des choses divines qu’ il faut les aimer pour les 
connaitre et qu’ on n’ entre dans la vérité que par la charité, dont ils ont 
fait une de leurs plus utiles sentences.”—PascaL, Opuscules (de I’ Art de 
Persuader). 


PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION. 


In this edition an Introduction and additional remarks 
on the Atonement are added, together with a few slight 
modifications in forms of statement. 


October 7, 1885. 


PREPACH 


Having been invited to deliver an address at the Princeton 
Theological School, I found the theme which I had chosen 
so attractive, that I wrote much more than it was possible 
to read in the time proper for such a discourse. I wrote, 
also, several supplementary essays,—branches, as it were, of 
the main stem. It turns out, however, that the branches in 
the aggregate take up more room than the stem out of 
which they grew. Such is the origin of the present book. 
I hardly need add that the hospitality of my brethren at 
Princeton does not render them in the least answerable for 


its contents. 


Gy PS 
New Haven, April 14, 1879. 


CONE INVES: 


Sine 
Introduction . : 5 5 ; 


e e ® ° ° ° 1 


St. Paul on the Limits of our Knowledge in Religion . mare 
Characteristics of Faith : . < : é : é di elo 
Connection of Faith with Feeling : ‘i i : k ees 
Connection of Faith with the Will . 5 : : ALG 
Criticism of Locke’s Definition of Faith . . , : : “ 316 
Extreme Supernaturalism of the early Socinians . > ¢ eats) 
The Characteristic Temper of Rationalism © é 5 5 a0 
Rationalism intolerant of Mysteries . : 4 : ; ; 3 eae 
What is Meant by a Mysterious Truth oo Se cpinteee Puaabet if 8 28 
Mystery not unfavorable to Piety 2 c ; é - £226 
Rationalism in conjunction with Orthodox Tenets . : - Be HE 
Rationalism overlooks the Influence of Sin upon the Intellect .. 28 
Rationalism ignores the Premises of Faith : : eine wn 29 
Different Degrees of Vividness in the Perception of Sin Rae UES) 
Catholic Nature of the Christian Sense of Guilt and of Sin . Sapo 
Tendency of Rationalism to take no account of implicit Reason- 

ing . - 5 3 ; : 5 aie A = 3 2 SB) 
Tendency of Rationalism to exaggerate the office of Logic in Re- 

ligion ; ites - Sees ; Pramas | 
Tendency of Rationalism to resolve Christianity into a Doctrine. 36 
Rationalism inclined to seek for Knowledge for its own Sake 178% 
The True Motive in the Search for Religious Truth sfubet J Bot 
Safeguards against Fancy and Enthusiasm F f < ° eee) 40) 
The Debatable Ground about a great Religious Truth 42 
Limits of Responsibility in meeting Objections to Christian Truth 43 


The Sources of our Beliefin God . i 2 y F mn 45 
Relation of the Will to Faith in God and in Conscience. . & - 49 


1x 


° 


Ceo ¥, ej 4 
* a Piety ; ee ey  . 3 F 
3 te ocak Sy Sot = pas Ks : ¢ 
; ot a faerie ETE 
° - ‘s : et i “. TANT aa RES 
ee, CoS EAD of Corer oe 
geitn age AIS ie 4 a 
CONTENTS. © 7 5 aete 
i Lit ee sags 
. es 2 ta, ott 
Zs 3 - ai . : PAG 
The Sources of Faith ina Future Life . . . . . . 


The Mystery.of the ‘Trinity "0/500" Lon Fs GSS nae ae ae 
The Problem of Universal Sin and Individual Responsibleness _ 
“Insufficiency of the Moral View of the Atonement . . . 
Reasonablenesss of the Doctrine of the Spirit’s Influence Sh ee 
Spiritual Insight requisite in the Interpretation of Scripture . ‘ 
Contradictory Judgments of Intellectual Men upon Books of the ae 
2: NBibles, (23h Ways te ok Se ao ga 
Power actually exerted by the Writingsof Paul . . . . «2 266: 
Rationalism involved ina priori Views of Scripture . 4. . 
Bishop Butler on a priori Ideas respecting Revelation . = Ba : 
The Gospels not conformed to a priort Expectations . . ‘ 
The Authority of Scripture not limited by Personal Insight. . 
The Divine and Human Elements in Scripture  . c : 
The Grand Aim of Christianity an Argument forits Truth . . 


APPENDIX. 


THE TEACHING OF THEOLOGY ON THE MORAL Basis oF FAITH. ~— 


AUSUSUING 9 HE ee ok ht va Vices. WS erie ae Ne nr 
Anselm peur eg aes ptiee : 2 A Z emf 
Bernard . “ : c : ; ua 
Bonaventura. . : . 3 | | 
Ugo Si Vietor bh te. che ee ee ee 


- Oa vain ee weet f ys es 4 $ i 


, E - De Melanchthon’ ec ses Dae eons be eee 3 ae 

é Tere ie or she ol oe ew cgcine peta te ee ee ea 
Pascal on Yim ede WOE ig inborn ghd ac = ee a 

Edwards pty Wai esos 0 eae SRO, a cena nS 2 


_ CONTENTS. xi 


PAGE 
Schleiermacher . ; . ° ° s ; A C : ‘ 08 
Recent German Theologians . F sarees c‘ ; iy to 
Coleridge . , : 2 : - °93 
J.H.Newman , s . ° = ekg! 

II. 
THE DOCTRINE OF NESCIENCE RESPECTING Gop. 

How far “the Infinite” is Knowable . Z : : 5 ome 99 
Spencer’s Criticism of Paley’s Illustration . 6 . : «0102 


Ly. 


THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN ITS RELATION TO THE ARGU- 
MENT OF DESIGN. 


Meaning of Evolution . ; ‘ : haere : ; ‘ . 104 
The Relation of Science to Religion . : - : : : . 106 
The Alternative of Design or Chance yee : : ; - 108 
Necessity of assuming Design ; 3 A F : 5 ; . 109 
Natural Selection generates Nothing . : : 3 : : eo 
Variation is under Guidance . : : ; - 3 Rea 8 bY 
Analogy between Works of Nature and of Art . ; ; J LLG 
Theory of “Conditions of Existence” . ; F : ; : PhS 
Mind consciously distinct from its Organism. : ; edd 
The Intuition of Self completes the Argument of nines : mela 


ENE 


THE REASONABLENESS OF THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE OF PRAYER. 


Fundamental Idea of Prayer . ; 2 } : : F ; » 128 
Petition not Dictation . : ; : : ; : . 129 
Limits to the Proper Sphere of Petition . - ‘ ; : . 180 
Means of answering Prayer for Spiritual Good . : ; ; Glo 
Our Belief in the Supernatural is subject to Education . : . 133 


Theistic View of the Order of Nature . ; : : 3 : . 134 


: ‘f Peat me Pe % Ys ina se 0 
- ; v Jee! 3 7 ek Bt 
“CONTENTS. ea ae 
pis mahi}, 
Nature a Part ofa more ExtensiveSystem . . . ie 
Ways of answering Prayer for Physical Changes : ‘ 


Interposition through the medium of Natural Law . 
The Uniformity of Nature and Miracles”. 5 
The Proposal to test experimentally the Efficacy of aes 


V. 


ek JESUS WAS NOT A RELIGIOUS ENTHUSIAST. 


Self-scrutiny necessary toChrist .  .  . 4 5 : 
His Sobriety tested by the Ordeal of Suffering . } 
His Holiness precludes Self-exaggeration . ¢ 


ee His Anticipations verified °-. 4)... an se le 


Wa: 


The Problem of the Atonement . ; 2 é 
Examination of the Views of President Edwards . 
The Theory of Dr. J. McLeod Campbell : 
phe leading Idéas: of Duther) 07.) 12" ee 
Exposition of Schleiermacher’s Doctrine . : ‘ 
The Theory of Rothe .  . : ; 14 i eee 
Tendencies of Modern Theology on this aac a 
Remarks of Canon Mozley . ; & : 5 ae 5 


3 . Wits : 


THE UNITY OF BELIEF AMONG CHRISTIANS. 


Doctrine and the Philosophy of Doctrine . as Ane 
Unity in respect to Fundamental Truth . ‘ Ate A 
Differences from Ambiguity of Languese : + RED RS 
Dnity in Devotion . ; 5 5 5 : 5 E ; 


INTRODUCTION. 


? 


THE call for a new edition of this little volume affords an 
opportunity to prefix a few remarks, for the sake of render- 
ing its main intent more clear. It is no part of the author’s 
design to disparage external evidence, or to set faith in any 
relation of antagonism to reason, or to imply that the - 
Christian believer has not, or may not have, good reasons to 


give for the faith that is in him. 


1. We give the name of the Christian Faith to the sum of 
beliefs which make up the substance of Christianity in its 
objective form. They are set forth in brief in the Apostles’ 
Creed. They comprise, as we there see, first, what are 
termed truths of natural religion; secondly, further truths 
of an abstract nature, such as the relation of Christ to God, 
which the Gospel Revelation affirms; and thirdly, the main 
historical facts of Christianity. We may say in general that 
the Christian Faith, objectively considered, includes doc- 


trines and facts. 


2. Faith subjective is the state or act of mind in which 


one lays hold of these truths with an inward assent or trust. 


9 : INTRODUCTION. 


They are not looked on as things doubtful or fictitious, but 


are acknowledged and grasped by the soul as real. — 


3. To this internal persuasion and apprehension there are 
two impelling forces. Faith is the product of an inward 
and an outward factor. There is the mind’s own feeling of © 
its dependence, its conscious spriritual hunger, the various 
operations of conscience, and the like, which are antecedent 
conditions and impulses from within. There is the address 
to the mind from without in the phenomena of nature, and 
in all that constitute the arguments for religion, whether 


natural or revealed. The distinction is very well stated by 


Canon Mozley. God may be conceived of as merely the im- 


personation of causes, the Being who simply gives existence 
to nature and watches its progress. Or, the mind may go 
further and conceive of Him as Moral Governor and Judge, 
“keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, and trans- 
gression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty.” * 
Add to this statement the remark that which of these con- 
ceptions is entertained, depends for the most part on the ac- 
tivity of one’s own conscience, or, in general, on one’s moral 
and spiritual state. Under the first, as the prevailing con- 
ception, there is no room for miracles; under the last, as the 
prevailing conception, the historical statements of the New 
Testament, into which miracles enter, are quite credible. 
Thus an internal element enters into the proof, even of his- 
torical Christianity, and alone gives it efficacy. “ External 


* Lectures of Miracles, pp. xXiv., XXv. 


INTRODUCTION. 3 


or historical evidence has an intrinsic defect in it, for the 
purpose of full persuasion, standing alone, without this in- 
ternal auxiliary, because evidence is, by its very nature, a 
double thing, in which an outer part has its complement in 
an inner, and both together make the whole thing. Ante- 
cedent. probability is a constitutional element of evidence, 
_ and external testimony has reasonably a different weight, 


according as it comes to us with or without it.” 


4. It is important distinctly to remember that as regards 
historical Christianity, as well as natural theology, the effect 
of the evidence hinges on the presence or absence of certain 
primary ideas, perceptions, convictions. Without certain 
assumptions of this character, not only does the proof fail of 
its effect; that failure, moreover, is legitimate. It is true, as 
Mozley avers, that he who rejects the Gospel miracles, “is 
reasonable in that rejection,” so long as he approaches the 
subject in that state of mind. There is no internal element 
to match with the external, and it is both elements, meeting 


together, by which the proof is made up. 


0. The same able theologian who has just been quoted 
has, also, illustrated another of the characteristics of faith, 
to which attention is called in the following pages,—namely, 
the concern which the will has in it. There are reasons to be 
given for faith, or for the propositions which are the object 
of faith ; but, in the first place, “the premises of faith are not 
so palpable as those of ordinary reason,” real and solid though 


they are: reason “depends entirely. on her own insight into 


4 INTRODUCTION. 


certain grounds, premises and evidences ”; and, secondly, 
the conclusion—in the particular case supposed, the existe 
ence of God—is of so amazing a nature that it requires trust 
to commit one’s self to it. This “principle of trust is faith— 
the same principle by which we repose in a witness of good 
character who informs us of a marvellous occurrence—so 
marvellous that the trust in his testimony has to be sustained 
by a certain effort of the reasonable will.” There is no ex- 
perimental verification ; hence there is requisite an exertion 
of energy on our part in order to accept the issue of the 


argument.* 


6. The reflex influence of character on the intellect, which 
it is one purpose of the following pages to illustrate, is a fact 
too plain to be questioned. Affirmations of it without end 
might be cited from authors of the most diverse creeds. I 
quote a passage from R. W. Emerson. That Mr. Emerson 
has been unduly extolled by admiring disciples as a philoso- 
pher, or expounder of philosophy—of Plato, for example— 
is true. His writings, nevertheless, contain much pithy and 
discerning comment on human nature and life. On the 
topic before us, he says: “So intimate is this alliance of 
mind and heart that talent uniformly sinks with character. 
The bias of errors of principle carries away men into perilous 
courses as soon as their will does not control their passion or 
talent. . . . Hence the remedy for all errors, the cure 
of blindness, the cure of crime, is love.” + r 


* Page 79. }{ Works, Vol. II., p. 431. 


4 


Pa 


INTRODUCTION. 5 


7. In considering this broad subject of the relations of faith 
and reason, it is essential to distinguish between the actual 
genesis of beliefs and their rational basis. Our religious beliefs 
spring out of experiences native to the soul and spontaneous, 
—out of the natural activity of the moral and spiritual nature 
which God has given us, and the likeness to Himself, and 
the affinity to Him, which are inwrought into our being.* 
Even John Calvin, in common with profound theologians 
of all ages, opens the “ Institutes” with an assertion of the 
“sense of a Deity ” which the human mind has by “ natural 

instinct,” and the “propensity to religion” which is incor- 
porated in human nature.t Now, the immediate activities of 
heart and conscience, which constitute the seed and sustain- 
ing life of religion, become the object of attention. When we 
inquire reflectively into the validity of our religious beliefs, the 
very existence of these instinctive sentiments and tendencies 

* In a recent work entitled “ Natural Law in the Spiritual World,” these 
truths appear to be overlooked. In the chapter on “ Biogenesis,” spiritual 
life is considered to be as foreign to man as physical life to inorganic matter, 
Spiritual life is made to be a literal creation. This is an over-statement. 
The “death” of sin isa death “wherein we walked.” The “life” of the be- 
liever in Christ, though dependent on a supernatural source, is a form of the 
activity of a moral and religious nature inherent in man (Acts xvii. 22, 28). 
Religion is not something imported into the Christian mind,—the addition 
of a faculty or attribute not existing (though it be dormant or misdirected) 
in the human soul. This over-statement is a fruit of the exaggeration of an 
analogy into a law of identity, which is at the basis of this otherwise interest- 


ing and suggestive book. 


1 ¢ Institutes, B I. ¢. iii. 1, 2. 


ee a ee a ae ee ee et Me Re ON OF 


GP: INTRODUCTION. : s 


forms one important part of the rational defence of the faith that 
has grown out of them. This deep peculiarity of our nature 
is itself an argument, a testimony of nature to the reality of the 
objects answering to it. It is not that “we believe because 
we believe;” this is not the true account of the matter; but 
because we believe, and are thus moved to believe by principles 
of our nature so deeply implanted, we conclude that our 
belief is rational, and when we find it, not contradicted, but 
corroborated from without, in the whole structure of the 
system of things of which we are a part, we are confirmed 


and established in the conviction that faith is not illusive. 


8. How the judgment respecting religious doctrine and 
the claims of Christianity to credence may be altered by the 
quickening of conscience, or by the acquiring of a deepened 
feeling, is one of the points touched upon in the following 
pages. Words, the symbols of thought, mean more or less 
according to the degree of life in the conscience and sensi- 
bility of him who hears or repeats them. An instructive 
illustration of this topic is found in one of the letters of 
Carlyle. His biographer is at pains to proclaim Carlyle’s (as 
well as his own) disbelief in the miraculous facts of the 
Gospel. It-does not appear, however, that either the one or 
the other ever studied with any thoroughness the evidences 
on which they rest. This is evident even in the case of Mr. 
Fronde whenever—for example, in one or more of his short 
essays—he deals with the subject. Carlyle retained the sense 


of God’s power and reign, which his Scottish birth and 


INTRODUCTION. 7 


training implanted. He preached sincerity and the ab- 
horrence of falsehood, with passionate fervor. But he re- 
tained, also, impressions as to historical Christianity which 
the early reading of Gibbon may have imprinted on his 
mind. It is doubtful, however, whether, notwithstanding the 
noble points in his character, there was room left by the 
colossal conceit and self-assertion that characterized him, for 
the spirit of dependence and humility which are essential in 
the Gospel.* Yet it is plain to any considerate reader of his 
melancholy Memoir that the lessons which thousands upon 
thousands of Christians learn at the Cross were just what he 
had need of. The ludicrous, if it were not sad, magnifying 
of small ills, and of larger labors and struggles such as a mul- 
titude of scholars and authors have patiently and quietly 
endured; the thoughtless, but still selfish, negligence of 
domestic obligations, that awakened too late in his own bosom 
so poignant remorse; the contemptuous, vituperative dis- 
paragement of eminent contemporaries (including Coleridge, 
who lacked Carlyle’s force of character, but was a poet and 
philosopher of larger and more varied gifts, on the whole, 
than he),—these glaring defects and faults would not have 
remained to provoke the chagrin and disappointment of his 
admirers, could he have listened to the invitation: “Come 


unto me .. . take my yoke on you . . . learn of 


* In no literary biography of our times, with the possible exception of the 
Memoirs of Harriet Martineau (an apostie of atheism), does self-esteem 


appear in so gigantic dimensions as in the journals and letters of Carlyle. 


ey Ls. 


8 INTRODUCTION. 


me.” But the particular passage to which reference has 
been made, is found in a letter of Carlyle to Erskine of 
Linlathen, written after the death of Mrs. Carlyle :— 


“*Our Father which art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy — 


name, Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done,’-—what else can 


we say? The other night,in my sleepless tossings about, 


which were growing more and more miserable,—these words, 


that brief and grand prayer, came strangely into my mind 
with an altogether new emphasis, as if written and saiiiee for 
me in mild pure splendor, on the black bosom of the night 
there; when I, as it were, read them, word by word, with a 
sudden check to my imperfect wanderings, with a sudden 
softness of composure that was much unexpected. Not for 
perhaps thirty or forty years had I ever formally repeated 
that prayer,—nay, I never felt before how intensely the voice 
of man’s soul it is; the inmost aspiration of all that is high 


and pious in poor human nature; right worthy to be recom- 


mended with an, ‘After this manner, pray ye.’” Here this 


old man found something in a familiar scripture which he 


had never seen there before; or, rather, to use Coleridge’s - 


expression, the scripture found him: “these words came 
strangely intomy mind . . . asifwritien and shining for 


me.” 


Was there not much more in the teachings of Jesus 
which Carlyle had failed to discern? Was there not in the 
character, as well asin the words of Christ, and in his whole 
personality, a unique peculiarity, an excellence and loftiness, 


which it only required the right mood of mind in him to 


Pe epee ae ee ee Se 


EL ae Pe ee, ee a MD ae aah 


INTRODUCTION. og 


recognize? Bereaved and wretched with a sorrow not un- 
mingled with remorse, he saw something that he had never 
seen before. And what was the effect? “A sudden softness 
of composure,” a check to “imperfect wanderings.” Strange 


_ power in that prayer of Jesus to chasten, subdue, comfort! * 

* We find the wife of Carlyle, under the pressure of physical distress, 
writing to him these moving words: “Oh dear! you cannot help me, though 
you would! Nobody can help me! Only God: and can I wonder if God take 
no heed of me when IJ have all my life taken so little heed of him?” “They 
that are whole need not a physician”; but it is a relief to find in those 
worthy, on many accounts, of honor and esteem, a conviction of this need 
developing itself. under calamity, and impelling them at last towards the 
source of help. : 

In another recent biography—“ George Eliot’s Life,’—there is a touching 
story of the struggle between the heart on one side and the imaginary 
teachings of science on the other. George Eliot, “with her pale, sickly face 
and dreadful headaches,” is toiling over her translation of Strauss. She is 
reported as saying that “she is Strauss-sick—it makes her ill dissecting the 
story of the Crucifixion, and only the sight of the Christ image and picture 
» make her endure it.” “This was an ivory image she had of the Crucified 
Christ over the desk in her study at Foleshill, where she did all her work 
at that time.” Yet Strauss’s “dissection” is admitted by discerning scholars 
of every school to be a sophistical juggle. His method then, in Germany, 
was deemed even by Baur fallacious and untenable. Yet here Miss Evans, 
with her restless mind, and subservience to the personal influence of the 
circle about her, gives up her faith, and apparently yields assent to so base- 
less a theory as that of Charles Hennell that the Gospel was derived from 
Essenism. In the “evangelicai period,” or phase, through which George 
Eliot passed, the faith of the Gospel struck no deep roots in her nature, Her 
religious expressions at that time are, no doubt, sincere, but they are arti- 
ficial. With her restlessness of mind, her susceptibility to personal in- 
fluence, in the absence of a corresponding depth and activity of conscience, 
she surrendered easily to the sway of the intellectual sceptics and disbe- 
lievers in whose society she found herself. One looks in vain in her letters 
for the traces of either a just appreciation or a thorough investigation of the 
peculiar and exceptional claims of Christianity. 


FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


GENTLEMEN OF THE THEOLOGICAL SCHOOL: 


I thank you for the opportunity given me to speak 
to you to-night. You have invited to address you one 
who can claim to represent no party or school in 
theology, but who feels himself drawn with an in- 
creasing conviction to the catholic truth which has 
_been the life of Christian piety in all ages of the 
Church. You will not expect me to traverse the old 
ground where our fathers crossed their lances in times 
gone by. Nor will you prefer that I should retreat to 
some scholarly theme, not more pertinent at one time 
than at another, and remote from the questions that 
command the attention of thinking men at present.. 
Relying on your candor, I choose rather to express 
frankly my thoughts in connection with a subject, 
which, though never void of interest, is, in our day, 
of special concern,—the Ascertainment of Religious 
Truth ; or, to state it otherwise, Farru anp Ratton- 


ALISM. 
11 


12 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


~ 


Those who are inclined to chafe at the narrow : 


bounds and indistinct nature of our knowledge in 


religion, may remember for their comfort that the 


Apostle Paul, though conscious of being an organ of ee } 


divine revelation, places himself in the same category — ~ 


with themselves. ‘‘ We know in part,” he says: “ We 


see through a glass darkly.” It was not a complete 
view, but a fragmentary one that he had of divine 
truth; as when you look off to a mountain that is 


partly hidden under clouds. You follow its outline 


for a certain distance, and then it is lost in the mist. 


A peak, here and there, emerges in the sunlight, but 
its connection with the mass below is broken off. And 
the perception even of what the Apostle did know had 


a certain obscurity attending it. It was not a behold- 


ing of the object itself directly. It was only a faint 


image that was discerned, like that reflected from a 


dim metallic mirror of the sort used in his time. The — 


language in which we utter religious thought, and the 
conceptions at the basis of it, are declared by him to 
be the lispings of a child, compared with the words 
and ideas that belong to mature manhood. They 
answer for the infant, but in course of time they are 
superseded by something more conformed to the 
reality. Yet, the boundaries that are set about our 


knowledge during our life on earth, and the immensity 


of the realm of the unknown that stretches away 


CHARACTERISTIOS OF FAITH. 13 


beyond our ken, afford not the least warrant for 
scepticism with respect to anything actually dis- 
covered. It did not subtract a jot from the confidence 
of Paul in that truth which had been disclosed to him. 
It has been well said by Paley that “true fortitude of 
understanding consists in not suffering what we do 
know to be disturbed by what we do not know.” * He 


who despairs of knowing a little, because he cannot 


know all, may be compared to one who is so bewil- — 
dered by the thought of the vast amount of pain, 


and sorrow in the world, which it is beyond his power 
to relieve, that he does not think it worth while to 
stretch out his hand to the one or two sufferers within 
his reach. 

I shall not undertake here to give an exhaustive 
definition of religious faith, but simply to point out 
some of its characteristics. 

Faith is not sight: it has respect to things not seen. 
Nor is there an internal organ of vision, corresponding 
to the eye, which literally gazes upon things invisible 
to sense. For such an immediate perception of the 
supernatural world, a miracle is requisite. Faith is 
the prelude,—possibly, in some way, it is the rudi- 
ment, of sight. It serves in the room of sight, on the 
present stage of our being; but sight itself is to 
follow (1 Cor. xiii. 12). “Faith,,” says Augustine, 


s * Natural Theology, Ch. v. 


jt) a ee ae Bn ee ee 


¥ * 
re ne ge orn tate ne prorat 


14 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


“is to believe what we do not yet see; and the reward = 3 


of this faith is to see what we believe: **. Oi 
as another deep-thinking writer has expressed it: 
“The very perfection and final bliss of the glori- 
fied spirit is represented by the Apostle as a 3 

plain aspect or intuitive beholding of truth in its 
eternal and immutable source.” { Faith is opposed, 
for one thing, to the assent produced by logical demon-- 
stration, where the outcome 1s knowledge. Faith, : 
however, need not involve any doubt or misgivings. 
In fact, though it may exist in different degrees of 
energy, may be strong or weak, the word naturally — 
suggests the absence of doubt, or an inward certitude. 
One of the disputed questions about faith is whether it 
be an immediate act of the mind, or the product of in- 
ference. Is there always a process of reasoning, em- 
bracing, at the least, one step? Pascal is one of the 
writers who has compared faith to the intuitions of 
number, space, time, etc. We have to start wita an 
act of trust in our faculties; we cannot prove the 
axioms which are the premises of all proof. Pascal's 
statement is valid against the logical fanaticism which ss 
scorns to take anything upon trust. If it were the 
case that the assent given in faith is immediate, such 
assent could not, merely on that ground, be branded 
as credulity. Let the point be decided as it may, still 


* Sermo xliii. + Coleridge (Shedd’s ed.,) Vol. 1. p. 449. 


FAITH AND FEELING. 15 


not even the primary truths of religion are to be 
placed in the catalogue of these axioms of the in- 
tellect,—for example, the properties of number and 
space—which all sound minds of necessity assume to 
be true. The grand peculiarity of religious faith is 
the part which the heart plays in it. Although an act 
of reason, if reason be taken in the broad sense, 
and, therefore, capable of a rational vindication, 
faith, nevertheless, depends on character, and it 
withers away when the feelings in which it has its 
root disappear. Faith is subjective to this extent, 
that its grounds are not appreciable by every mind, 
by the good and evil alike. A living faith is not 


connected with any particular grade of intellectual. 


power. ‘The early Christians were many of them 
_ slaves; they were generally of the lower class; they 
could not spell correctly, as we see by the epitaphs in 
the catacombs. Most believers of whatever age know 
little or nothing of historical evidences. They cannot 
tell whether Justin Martyr quotes the Gospels of the 
canon. ‘They cannot answer the objections of learned 
infidels to natural or revealed religion. Yet it is far 
from being true that their faith is the mere result of 
tradition and education. It may be the natural, 
legitimate offspring of impressions of feeling, which 
the universe within and around them, and the Christ 
of the Scriptures, have made upon their souls. Before 


16 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


their faith can be denounced as irrational, the sponta- 
neous feelings at the root of it'must be shown to be 
abnormal. This leads me to say that however we 
may decide the question whether faith is immediate or 
inferential, this is certain that it need not arise 
through any explicit process, of the several steps of 
which the believer takes account. Let me add one 
thing more. Into the deepest exercise of faith, the 
will enters. Trust is an act; I might say, a venture. 
So it is when we believe in Christ. As He identified 
Himself with us, we identify ourselves with Him. 
This is the great secret of the Gospel. Because the 
will turns the scale to the one side or the other, 
atheism, and disbelief in the Gospel, are treated in 
the Bible as sins. A demand is made upon men to 
believe. Who ever commanded another to believe 


that two and two are four, or to accept the doctrine of — 


free-trade, or the nebular hypothesis ? 


No writer has had more influence in forming opinion 
on this subject, in English-speaking communities, than 
Locke. He defines faith to be assent to any proposi- 
tion, which is not made out by deductions of reason, 
‘upon the credit of the proposer, as coming from God, 
in some extraordinary way of communication.” You 
believe on the authority of a witness, having first 
established by proof his credibility. On this definition 


LOCKE'S IDEA OF FAITH. 17 


the criticism might be made that it limits faith to the 
eredence of propositions or doctrines; trust in persons, 
in any other capacity than as witnesses, not being 
expressly included. Augustine and the schoolmen, 
whose general notion of faith was a more satisfactory 
one, do not always keep clear of the same error. An- 
other exception to be taken to Locke’s view is that it 
makes no room for the truths of natural religion ; for 
example, that “ things which are seen were not made of 
things which do appear ’’—truths, nevertheless, which 
are proper objects of faith: Moreover, how is the 
prior fact of the credibility of the divine messengers 
to be established? No doubt, faith embraces a belief 
in the testimony of God. But how shall we assure 
ourselves that we have that testimony? What are 
the data on the basis of which the mind advances to 
this conclusion? Certainly, they are not such as avail 
_ to convince all. Many historical inquirers are found 
to disbelieve, who ordinarily are chargeable with no 
special want of discrimination or of candor. Shall we 
not have to consider the contents of the testimony, to 
inquire whether any communication is likely to come 
to us from God, and whether the doctrine delivered 
bears in it marks of truth, and of having so high and — 
pure an origin? Have we any need of a revelation? 
These and other preliminary questions may, perhaps, 
be answered differently by different persons, and so 


18 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


there fails to be an agreement as to the data on which 
assent or denial must depend. In the ordinary affairs 
of life, we make up our minds under the influence of 
multiform impressions, which are often’ subtle, not 
easy to be analyzed by ourselves, and which are by 
no means the same in all individuals. These impres- 
sions have each of them a certain power to induce a 
judgment one way or the other. The verdict of the 
mind is the result of their collective action. Locke’s 
defect is, not so much in what he says, as in what he 
fails to say, on this topic. He was a lover of truth, 
an honest man; but we miss in him a certain depth 
and intensity of moral and religious feeling, which 
belong to profound teachers upon the philosophy of 
religion, like Augustine, Pascal, Luther, Coleridge, 
Edwards. Hence his Socinian proclivities, and the 
circumstance that he became an oracle of that class. 
It was the same in politics; his theory of the social 
compact is a piece of Rationalism. He founds the 
obligations of civil society on the voluntary agreement 
of the individuals that compose it. How much pro- 
founder the philosophy which finds in society “a pre- 
disposed order of things,” to use the phrase of Burke, 


with which the will of every rational being is supposed 


to agree; that philosophy which recognizes in the 
state, as in the family, an object about which deep 
instincts of humanity entwine themselves, prior to all 


THE EARLY SOOINIANS. 19 


scientific analysis! The real drift of Locke’s political 
theory comes out in the Contrat Social of Rousseau. 
It has been well described as a kind of adventurous 
courage in Paley, whose mental power was less than 
that of Locke, but whose general tone of feeling was 
similar, to go forth against the opponents of Chris- 
tianity, demanding of them no concession except that 
a revelation of a future state of rewards and punish- 
ments “is not improbable, or not improbable in any 
great degree.”* But this admission, which is all that 
Paley calls for in his “ Preparatory Considerations,” 
does not suffice, in point of fact, in numerous instances, 
to impart a convincing efficacy to his argument, not- 
withstanding the masterly skill and unrivaled perspi- 
cuity with which he has presented it. 

It is a curious and instructive fact that the founders 
of modern Socinianism were extreme supernaturalists. 
Their tendency was to attribute our knowledge of re- 
ligion almost exclusively to Revelation, and to make 
the one proof of Revelation miracles. Some of the 
_ Socinian leaders in Poland found no valid evidence of 
the being of God except in Scripture. The fact of a 
future life was made to rest, in the same way, wholly 
on the testimony of the Bible. On this theory, we 
become acquainted with religion as we learn the exist- 


* Paley’s Evidences, “ Preparatory Considerations.” 


20 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ence and geographical features of an unknown conti-— & 


nent, by no other means than through information 
brought to us by a credible traveler. The principle 
of authority, which has its rightful place among the 
bases of belief, is made the all in all. Religion is 
something imported into the soul by instruction duly 
authenticated; not a slumbering life waked up within 
us by a supernatural approach. This character of the 


old Socinianism shows how extremes meet. There- . 


bound to entire disbelief in Reyelation naturally fol- 


lowed such a meagre notion of religion and of the 


function of Revelation, and the exaltation of miracles 


to the exclusion of other proofs of Christianity. 


We shall get more light upon the nature of faith if we. 


look at its opposite—the temper of Rationalism. Ra- 
tionalism is a term often used to designate the position 


of those who disbelieve in Revelation, and suppose that 


whatever knowledge we have in religion is derived from 


unassisted reason. It is applied to such as reject the — 2 


miraculous element in Christianity ; for example, to 


the Kantian theologians in Germany, whose creed was 


made up of three articles; God, free-will, and immor- | 


tality, and who cared only for the morals of the Gos- 
pel; and to the later Pantheistic Rationalists, the dis- 
ciples of Hegel, who resolved Christianity into a meta- 


physical speculation, of which the Gospel history is a 


ry a eats 2 " 
re at ae age 


ays ae te ha 5 
RL EY om 


: 
he 


am. 


xX Coes 


, 
Yijou? S78 
eee 


‘ 
THE RATIONALISTIC SPIRIT. Ot 


loose, popular, mythical equivalent. But I speak of 
Rationalism now, not as standing for a set of opinions, 

but rather as a method or spirit. It is not impossible 
that the Rationalistic temper or method should be as- 
sociated for the time with orthodox tenets—an unnat- 
ural union to be sure, and one that could not last. 
Thus in Germany, before Schleiermacher came for- 
ward to vindicate for religion an independent founda- 
tion inhuman nature, much of the current orthodoxy 
was penetrated with a Rationalistic leaven. It was a 
verstandes-theologre, to use the term applied to it by 
later believing theologians like Tholuck and Neander. 
I think that I am not unjust in saying that a like 
tendency characterized a prominent section of ortho- 
dox teachers in New England, before the outbreaking of 
- the Unitarian revolt. Jonathan Edwards had a large, 
rich nature, deep wells of feeling, a subtle, spiritual in- 
sight. His book on the Will is not drawn out of his 
deepest vein. One should look for that to his sermon 
on Spiritual Light, or to his remarks on the Satisfac- 
tion of Christ, a discussion which appears to me, in some 
of its parts, to go deeper into the heart of that subject, 
than the treatises of Grotius or Anselm, or almost any - 
other essay on the same theme, ancient or modern. 
But the mystical element was wanting in the arid 
mind of his son, the younger President Edwards, and 
conspicuously in Emmons; and some of the “‘improve- 


92 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ments” in theology which were brought in by theolo- 
gians of their stamp are neither tenable in themselves, 


nor adapted to conciliate philosophical adversaries of 


the evangelical creed. 


Rationalism denotes a certain usurpation of reason. 


The understanding steps out of its province, arrogates — 


to itself more than belongs to it, refuses to hear other 
voices than its own, disregards the just claims of other 
departments of our being, or spurns the aid which they 


afford in the ascertaining of truth. The understand- — 


ing exalts its own separate, insulated function, pushes 


on without its natural auxiliaries—sensibility and — 


conscience, the life and experience of the soul—and 
disdains feeling as an indirect source of light, and a 


legitimate warrant of conviction. Let us attend to 
several of the phases which the Rationalistic temper — 


may assume. 

1. Rationalism is impatient of mysteries in reli- 
gion.* It demands that everything shall be made 
plain. It will not endure the twilight, or the night 
when only a few stars glimmer to guide the wayfarer 


until the dawn shall appear. : 


* The word mystery has in the New Testament a peculiar sense. 
It signifies what once was hidden, but is now revealed: Rom. xi. 
25, xvi. 25, 1 Cor. ii. 7, 9, Eph. i. 9, Mark iv. 11. The truth thus 
revealed may, or may not be, in our sense of the term, mysterious, 
t. €., only partly explicable. 


MYSTERIES. 23 


~ What is meant by a mysterious truth? Obviously 
not a truth of which we have no knowledge whatever, 
and which, therefore, stands in no relation to the know- 
ing faculty. America was not a mystery to the an- 
cients, before its existence was even surmised. It did 
not become a mystery until a glimpse was caught of 
its shores, or until, at least, there was an incipient be- 
lief that a continent lay to the west of the Atlantic. 
Many call that a mystery which they cannot wnagine, 
or present as a concrete object before the mind’s eye. 
But this we cannot do of man in the abstract, as dis- 
tinguished from this or that individual, or of any gene- 
ral notion. Things which persons cannot picture to 
themselves, they will say that they do not understand. 
Hiven educated persons, who ought to know better, fall 
sometimes into this way of speaking. With more 
truth may obscure or inadequate ideas, like substance, 
power, the soul, infinite space, infinite duration, be 
styled mysterious. The conceptive faculty is baffled in 
the attempt to grasp certain objects, though they are 
known as realities. Locke has much to say on this 
subject.* Now we cannot deal with what is partly seen 
as if it were seen wholly. And so if we proceed to 
reason upon things imperfectly conceived, if we deal 
with notions as co-extensive with the object, when they 
are not, we may be led into contradictions. There are 


* Essay, b. ii. cc. xxix. xxxi. 


24 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


propositions in which we may rest as far as they are Ms, 
the correlate of moral or practical truth, but which 
may not be pushed out to further conclusions. This oe : 
is the nature, then, of mysterious truth. Something . - i 
is gained if even this obvious fact is admitted, that we : 
are bound to regard as true much which it is impossi- 
ble to realize in imagination. God—to take one ex- 
ample—formed his purposes, yet his purposes are : <a 
eternal, There never was a time when they were 
not. A 
We are not to make mysteries of our own. We are a 
not to create artificial difficulties by our own hypothe- — ‘s : 
ses and speculations; we are not to invent untenable a 
dogmas, and then take refuge in mystery asa shelter _ 
against assault. Sir William Hamilton says, in his de- 
cided way, of Brown’s defence of his theory of percep- 4 
tion: “ Having swamped himself in following the ignis a 
fatuus of a theory, he has no right to refer its private _ 4 
absurdities to the imbecility of human reason, or to za 
generalize his own factitious ignorance by a ‘Quantum i 
est quod nescumus !’”* Nor is the plea of mystery to < ,; 
be interposed as a bar to study. The fact that the « 
truths of Christianity are detached and incomplete, may 
well stimulate us to explore for their hidden bonds of a 
union, and for the complementary truth which they a 
imply. It has been said that the opinions of most. 


* Edinburgh Review, 1830. Saee ee bY 


MYSTERIES. 25 


men mark the point where they grew tired of think- 
ing. Perhapsa like remark might be made of the 
boundaries by which many fence off the region of the 
unknowable. I may not be able to solve a problem, 
but another may do better. In theology, individuals 
now and then appear to doa work like that of the 
bold explorers who push their voyages into unknown 
seas, and descry lands never before discovered. ‘‘C@lo- 
rum perrupit claustra”—he broke through the in- 
closures of heaven—is the exalted praise given to Sir 
William Herschel, on his monument at Upton. There 
are great teachers of the Church to whom, in our en- 
thusiasm, we are sometimes moved to accord a like 
tribute of admiration. 

But mystery there must be. Even on the baldest 
theory of materialism, our existence, when we pause 
to think upon it, is a wonder to ourselves. When we 
reflect that we are creatures, when we consider the 
slow unfolding of our powers, the disadvantages under 
which we seek for knowledge, the weakness of child- 
hood and of old age, the distraction of earthly care, 
the influence of prejudice, the thousand avenues 
through which error and delusion may enter, the mar- 
vel is that any-man can dream of being omniscient. 
The other extreme of absolute skepticism, or confessed 
total ignorance, would be less irrational. 

And mystery there will always be. Even when we 
‘ 


26 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


emerge into the brighter light of heaven, there will 
forever be to the finite mind an unexplored beyond. 
Great truths have an unilluminated, as well as an illu- 
minated side. ‘ Three-sevenths of the moon’s sur- 
face,” writes Alexander von Humboldt, “are entirely 


concealed from our observation, and must always re- 


FOF 


main so, unless new and unexpected disturbing causes — 


come into play. These cosmical relations involuntarily 
remind us of nearly similar conditions in the intellec- 


tual world where * * * there are regions simi- 


larly turned away from us, and apparently unattainable, 
of which only a narrow margin has revealed itself, for 
thousands of years, to the human mind, appearing, 
from time to time, either glimmering in true or delu- 
sive light.” * It is a mistake to think that practical 
piety would be promoted by dispelling all mystery, 
and bringing everything within the grasp of finite 


comprehension. We look up to things that are above. ; 


We do not adore what is on our level, or beneath us. 
The vault of heaven is not made less impressive to the 
beholder by the thought that stretching away beyond 
the utmost reach of his vision are limitless fields of 
space. Who would pour the glare of noon-day through 


the aisles and “high embowed roof” of the cathedral q 


where he kneels in worship? Why do we speak of “a 


dim religious light”? The future life is behind the - 4 


* Cosmos, Bohn’s ed., vol. I., p. 83. 


RATIONALISTIC THEOLOGY, oF 


veil; and as John Foster has said, there are “‘descanters 


on the invisible world” . . . ‘from the vulgarity of 


whose illuminations you are excessively glad to escape 
into the solemn twilight of faith.” Itis the deep mystery 
of a human soul that renders it an object of such fasci- 
nating interest. We are not much attracted by shal- 


low natures, who show all that is in them. How often 


has it been imagined that the power of Christianity 


_ was to be increased by getting rid of the truths that 


baffle the attempt at precise definition, and shade off 


into mystery! I could bring you passages from Dr. 


Channing, Dr. Gannett, and others, which confidently 
predict that “ liberal Christianity,” as they termed it, 
would prove a great bulwark against infidelity. Chris- 


“rational”? would disarm its 


tianity by being made 
opponents. They were sincere in this expectation ; 
but they lived to see movements springing up under 
their eyes, which demonstrated how groundless it was. 
Liberal Christianity did not prove to be the precur- 
sor of a new era of faith, and the solvent of unbe- 


lief. On the contrary, its progeny excited amazement 


_ and a degree of dismay in those who had unwittingly 


assisted at their birth. 

Under this head, I must illustrate the remark that 
the Rationalistic tendency is not confined to heterodox 
schools of thought. High Calvinists have sometimes 
assumed to unveil the motives of God in the creation 


a 


28 FAITH AND RATIONALISM, =. 


of the universe and of man, to an extent not warranted 


by Revelation. How different is the tone of Bishop 
Butler ; as when he says: “The whole end for which 
God made and thus governs the world, may be utterly 
‘beyond the reach of our faculties. There may be 
somewhat in it as impossible for us to have any con- 
ception of, as for a blind man to have any conception 
oi colors: * ke 

2. Rationalism fails to take into account the influ- 
ence of sin upon our capacity for investigating reli- 
gious truth. True, this darkening influence may be 
over-stated, or stated so that scepticism is the proper 
corollary. This is one extreme. The other extreme a 
is that Pelagianism of the intellect, which springs out ae 
of a Pelagian idea of sin, and is oblivious of one grand =~ 
fountain of intellectual error. The caution, the mod- — ‘ ; 
esty, the humility, the contentment with partial know- : 
ledge, of one who is conscious not only of the natural 4 
weakness of his intellectual powers, but, also, of the = 
infirmity consequent upon sin, are foreign to the i 
Rationalistic spirit. It is not alone, or chiefly, that a 
sin may render one sluggish in the search for truth, or 
engender an unfair bias, or a selfish reluctance to a 
admit an unwelcome discovery. These vices do often 4 
exist in professed inquirers for religious truth. But — 
this is not the worst effect of sin. Far from it. In- a 


* Analogy, P. L., ch. 10. 


ERRORS OF RATIONALISM. 29 


activity of conscience, a blunted discernment of the 
truth, when there is no conscious hatred of it, or 
intellectual dishonesty,—the most baneful influence of 
sin is of this character. Its action, like that of an 
opiate, is to dull the perceptions. And it is the higher 
faculties of the soul which are thus affected by the 
alienation of the will from God. A man understands 
the world in which he feels at home, which calls out 
his sympathy, where his hopes are fastened, to which 
he has given up the affections of his nature. For the 
‘natural man,” it is not the world of “ things not 
seen and eternal.” ‘ How can ye believe,” said Jesus, 
“which receive honor one of another ?”’ The love of 
distinction precluded the possibility of faith. The 
heart had its object and was satisfied. How could it 
go forth to a higher good? Without a craving for it, 
how could it understand it ? 

3. Rationalism ignores, partially or wholly, the pre- 
mises of religious faith. Moral and religious impres- 
sions, that involve, or lead to, faith, are phenomena of 


experience. They must be known through experience, 


if known at all, like the filial feeling, or love between 


the sexes. Aman born deaf is a poor judge of music; 
aman born blind cannot safely reason upon colors. 
The Bible frequently calls those who are insensible to 
the realities of religion, “deaf” and “blind.” The 


sense of these realities varies very much in degree in 


30 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


different persons. Where it is feeble, the antecedent 
condition of faith is proportionately absent. ‘Take the 
perception of the evil of sin—in what different degrees — se 
does it exist! How different are the images which the : 

same words call up! Compare the penitent thief on a 
the Cross with the impenitent! Compare the Publican — 
in the parable with the Pharisee! The sensation of a 
guilt is very faint in some men. In Paul, Luther, | a 
Wesley, Bunyan, Edwards, and in a multitude of less 7 
fame, the sense of unworthiness is overwhelming. 
They can only cry, “Infinite upon infinite!” Now By 
here is a variable element; and yet it is an element 
that will give shape and color to all of a man’s religious : a : 
beliefs. Let me quote a few lines from Dr. Newman: | 
“Different, indeed, is his view’—the view taken by a pe 
religious man— of God and of man, of the claims of — 
God, of man’s resources, of the guilt of disobedience, 4 
and of the prospect of forgiveness, from those flimsy, _ 
self-invented notions, which satisfy the reason of the : a 
mere man of eS or the prosperous and self-indul- q 
gent philosopher!” .. “To see truly the cost and. 4 
misery of sinning, we must ae the public haunts of — ; 
business and pleasure, and be able, like the angels, to a : 
see the tears shed in secret; to witness the mee 
of pride and impatience, where there is no “SOLTOW 3 
the sting of remorse, where yet there is no repente 
ance; the wearing, never-ceasing struggle between 


\ et 
- eee 


THE SENSE OF SIN. Skt 


conscience and sin; the misery of indecision; the 
harassing, haunting fears of death, and a judgment to 
come; and the superstitions which these engender. 
Who can name the overwhelming total of the world’s 


guilt and suffering,—suffering crying for vengeance on 


the authors of it, and guilt foreboding it!”* Suppose 


es 


one to have his eye opened to the appalling reality of 
*sin and guilt; his judgment on every leading question 
of religion and theology will be powerfully affected by 
that perception. The being of God, the need of deliv- 
erance from without, the atonement, the Spirit’s in- 
fluence, will present themselves to him in an utterly 
new light. Take, for one instance, the sinless char- 
acter of Jesus! What a momentous fact this is now 
felt to be! “This man hath done nothing amiss!” 
To the Penitent on the Cross, this utterance had a 
depth of meaning which ordinary minds cannot fathom. 
There is need, first, of that sense of unworthiness 
which had expressed itself in the honest, sad confes- 
sion: ‘We, indeed, suffer the due reward of our 
deeds!” The innocence of Jesus, and his own con- 
scious guilt—each cast an illumination upon the other. 
Has a man struggled with the appetites of sense, or 


* University Sermons, pp. 114, 115——The difference between 
knowing the truths of natural religion and knowing them as they 
exist in another individual’s mind, is forcibly set forth by Mozley, 
Miracles, p. xxviii. 


39 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


with the selfish thirst for human praise, or has he 3 
known sin in any form with that intimate noe 
that comes from an experience of its power, the fact — 
that Christ was absolutely without sin, that with all 
His purity of conscience, which pierced through every — 
disguise, not a syllable of self-accusation mingled in a 
His prayers to the Father to whom He laid bare Hig 
spirit,—not even when He was thrown back on Him- e 
self by the dreadful ordeal of suffering—this fact is 
more impressive than any miracle that He wrought, Be 
and renders the miracles credible. Yet to one who . 
knows not sin in this living way, the same fact may 3 
hardly excite a moment’s attention. : 
But some one may say to you, in the way of al . 
jection: “TI have no such feeling respecting sin; your 
conviction on this subject, and, therefore, the beliefs ~ 
induced by it, are subjective.” This you will have to 
allow; you can pretend to no demonstration. You a 
speak for yourself. But you can affirm, first, that this — 
experience is as distinct and as inexpugnable in your cf 
mind as any fact of consciousness; amd that for yourss a 
self, you are as sure of the Peale of sin and guilt as. 
of the existence of the external world, and, _ perhaps, ‘ 
more so; and, secondly, that you do not stand alone. _ 
The Catholic Church is with you; a great number out 
of every nation, and kindred, and people and tongue, 7 
in a long course of centuries, give a like Sa 


abe a, St ae a rae Net 
Pcie Raine ' ' 


ERRORS OF RATIONALISM. 33 


This experience is not confined to an individual; it 
cannot be set aside as something merely subjective, 
personal, mystical, eccentric. It has a catholic qual- 
ity. Nay, it is met with on heathen as well as on 
Christian ground. If you discredit Paul, go to Seneca. 
Rationalism makes light of assents of the mind, of the 
antecedents of which it is practically ignorant. It 
reasons within a sphere where the data of inference 
are faintly perceived, and thus it reasons in the dark. 

4. Rationalism is inclined to take no account of 
implicit mental processes. In the common affairs of 
life, men generally reason without distinctly knowing 
it. They do not analyze the process, either while it 
is going forward, or afterward. They bring its 
validity to no formal test. It is considered the attri- 
bute of genius to bound to its goal, without taking the 
intermediate steps, or else taking them so rapidly that 
they are not separately discerned in consciousness. 
Genius divines the truth before it is proved. The 
story is told of Hayden that one to whom he under- 
took to give lessons in thorough bass inquired of him 
why he put this note and that chord in his sympho- 
nies; to which the puzzled composer could only 
answer, “ Because it was right.” What is sagacity but 
a power of instantaneous judgment? The steps of the 
mental process are not separated; they have been 
ok to the spokes in a swiftly-revolving wheel. 


34 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


The sagacity of a merchant, a sea-captain, a physician, 


an artisan, a teacher, may be a sure guide, even when 
it is difficult for him to assign reasons for his mental 
decisions. ‘“‘I have fought many battles,” said Welling- 
ton to Sir William Napier,—“ and have acquired an 
instinct about them which I cannot describe; but I 
know how to fight a battle.” Tact, if it be not a strictly 
intuitive perception, is a form of rapid, implicit reason- 
ing. Locke himself says: “God has not been so spar- 
ing to men [as] to make them barely two-legged ani- 
mals, and left it to Aristotle to make them rational, 4. 
e., those few of them that he could get so to examine 
the grounds of syllogisms,” etc. “He has given them a 


mind that can reason,” ... “it has a native faculty 
to perceive the coherence, or incoherence of its ideas,’”* _ 


etc. The mass of Christians are persuaded of the 
truths of religion, not by arguments formally drawn 
out, and weighed singly, but as the result of a mental 


process which may not be any the less valid for not 


being the object of reflective analysis. 

5. The remark may be added that Rationalism ex- 
aggerates the office of logic in religion. In ascertain- 
ing religious truth, it is first of all important that the 
soul should have the experiences which are the ante- 
cedents of conviction ; for example, that life should be 
infused into the conscience. Men do not reason them- 


* Essay, B. iv., ch. xvii. 


a i a kag iat ota als aoa 


LOGIC IN RELIGION. 35 


selves into the exercise of love, any more than they 
reason themselves into the perception of the beauty of 
a landscape, or into the enjoyment of a painting of 
Titian. There must be life, and its phenomena must be 


presented in consciousness, in order to have something 


toreason upon. This is simply to say that in order to 
understand life, one must live. If a child would see 
into the rationale of the family institution, let him 
exercise filial love and obedience, and in such ways 
provide himself with the materials for a philosophy of . 
the subject. The comparative insufficiency of logic as 
a means of awakening religious faith is obvious to 
wise men. Says a great writer: “ First shoot round 
corners, and you may not despair of converting by a 
syllogism.” ‘“ Logicians are more set upon concluding 
rightly, than upon right conclusions.” —“ After all, 
man is not a reasoning animal; he is a seeing, feeling, 
contemplating, acting animal.”* Let me add that the 
very process of testing faith by analysis may con- 
celvably destroy it. The sense of the authority of con- 
science, of the beauty of holiness, of guilt, of depend- 
ence, may vanish in the process of inspecting it. 
Dissection destroys life in the very act. Feeling is 
shy, and flies when it is sharply looked at, and put in 
a crucible. The process was healthy, rational, by 
which the mind advanced from these experiences to a 


* Newman’s Grammar of Assent, p. 91. 


36 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


conclusion; but take the experiences away, which are 
largely spontaneous, and the conclusion goes with 
them. The foundation is swept away, and the super- 
structure falls too. : 

6. Rationalism tends to regard Christianity exclu- 
sively as a doctrine. ‘There is no need to say that, in. 
itself considered, the teaching of Christ cannot be 
valued too highly. He came to bear witness to the 
truth. But then even His teaching is not a body of 
abstractions. Its theme was partly His personal rela- — 
tion to men; the import to be attached to His victory _ 
over evil, to His death, to His resurrection; the fact of 
His reign, His intercession, His invisible presence with _ 
His disciples. to the end of the world. His coming 
into the world was an act of love; a free act, not a 
proposition in ethics or religion. His work stands. 
forth as an achievement. It is not a theorem, it is not 
a deduction of logic; it is a deliverance through a 
deed. If there were nothing but doctrine, the teacher — 
might be dropped out of sight, as, on that theory of 
the Gospel, he generally will be, sooner or later. If I 
have the writings of Aristotle, I have all that he can 
do for me. I may be ignorant of the author, I may 
forget his existence, without any serious loss. To the : 
view of Christ as a Teacher, it may be added thatHe © 
is, also, an Example. The example of Christ, also, is 
of priceless worth. But then the Rationalist will 


fore 
P “ 


THE SEARCH FOR KNOWLEDGE. 37 


sometimes ask, What care I whether it be history or 
myth? All that is righteous, noble, and holy in His 
character as it is set forth in the record, remains so, 
even if that character is imagined. Hence Christ 
Himself, as an actual person, is of little or no account. — 
In opposition to such ideas, it is something to see that 
a work was done by Christ which is a ground of 


' reconciliation and peace, only as it is felt and acknow- 


ledged to be real and historical. But we do not attain 


to the full Christian position, as opposed to the 


Rationalistic, until we see that faith is a personal 
relation of the soul to a living, present Christ, whereby 
its isolated, separate, selfish life is given up. Then we 
penetrate to the heart of the Gospel as taught by St. 
Paul and St. John. We believe not merely in a 
historical Christ of the past, but in a living Saviour, 
without whom we “can do nothing.” . 

7, Rationalism, even in its better types, is prone to 
seek for religious truth merely for its own sake. Is 
not this right? Is there any more exalted motive to 
impel the inquirer? Yes, there is a higher motive 
than the love of knowledge. That higher impulse is 
the love of goodness. There is an aspiration to be 
perfect in character; a hunger for righteousness; a 
yearning to be just, holy, faithful, obedient, loving. 
The promise is not to the lover of knowledge, but to 
the pure in heart. He that doeth the will of God 


38 FAITH AND RATIONALISM, — 

shall know of the doctrine. It is revealed to “ babes.” 
Ido not see how any earnest man can sanction the much 
applauded remark of Lessing, that if truth were offered 
in one hand, and the search for truth in the other, he 
would choose the latter.* This offers an affront to 


truth. It puts the pleasure of the chase above the 


prize at the end of it. No one would hope much from 
efforts to ascertain religious truth, that were instigated 
by the love of money. Where a student is instigated 


predominantly by the desire of literary fame, which — 


Hume avows to have been his “ruling passion,’+ it is 
no cause for wonder if the gates into the sanctuary of 
truth are closed against him. But, if the Scriptures 
are to be trusted, what greater success can be expected 
for researches which proceed from no other impulse 
than intellectual curiosity? There is no royal road 
into the kingdom of God, opened for the acute, the 
bright-minded, the speculative, the learned. “He 
took a child and set him in the midst of them.” 
There is but one door, the door of humility. I think 


that if the unbelievers who just now figure prominent- 


ly among the writers and lecturers in Natural Science, 


had the simple love of goodness which belonged és 


* As Shakespeare says of a lover’s pleasure, before and after his 
suit is granted : i 
“Things won are done, joy’s soul lies in the doing.”— 


Troilus and Oressida. 
+t See Hume’s Autobiography. 


a 


. ate e ae : th ; 
pos 4 ig « Se 3 ee ae en are wes Tee 
ST = ee Oe aS oe 3 


THE CRAVING FOR KNOWLEDGE. 39 


Kepler, and Newton, and Faraday, they would, like 
these, believe in God and in Christianity. They would 
then stand at the right point of view. They would 
feel the need of the salvation of Christ for themsetves, 
and would believe in it from its correspondence to this 
need. “They that are whole need not a physician.” 
Goethe, in his powerful drama, has described that 
unbridied lust of knowledge, which longs to 


4 detect the inmost force 
Which binds the world, and guides its course ; 
Its germs, productive powers explore.” * 


Disheartened by the fruitless struggle to unravel the 
mysteries of being, Faust will taste of the tree of 
knowledge of good and evil. He will know the de- 
lights of sense : 


“The thread of thought at last is broken 
And knowledge brings disgust unspoken. 
_ Let us the sensual deeps explore.” 


In truth his pact with Mephistopheles was made 
earlier, when he aspired to omniscience. He sought 
then to break through the barriers of finite being. 
The reaction of sensual passion is strange, yet not un- 


* “¢____ was die VJelt 
Im Innersten zusammenhilt, 
Schaw’ alle Wirkenskraft und Samen.”’—Faust, Th. 1. 


° £9) Verte 
ay eo 


40 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


natural, in one who, having made a god of science, has _ 


attempted a wild flight into a region inaccessible to 
man, and is flung breathless to the earth. The rest- 


less craving that is foiled in the pursuit of one object 


turns to another. 


If the rank belongs to faith which we have claimed 
for it, the question may arise, What safeguard have 
we against superstition? What shall prevent us from 
mistaking the dreams of fancy for realities? In 
answer to this question it might be said that men are 
not found to be infallible in their logic more than in 
their feelings. How shall they be sure that their rea- 
soning is exact, that no weak link gets into the chain? 
Prejudice and passion may warp the intellect of the 
most expert logician. Fallacies creep into the argu- 
ment of astute reasoners. No sound man yields to 
arguments for a proposition that contravenes the 
moral sense, whether he can detect a flaw in them or 


not. 
“The estate of man would be, indeed, forlorn, 
If false conclusions of the reasoning power 
Made the eye blind, and closed the passages 
Through which the ear converses with the heart, *” 


Reason, it has been justly observed, may exercise a 
critical office with regard to a process which the under- 


* Wordsworth’s Excursion, b. iv. 


CRITICAL OFFICE OF REASON. Al 


standing of itself is incompetent to originate. There 
is a regulative function which it may use in relation | 
to experiences of the soul which have a subsistence of 
their own. ‘These do not disdain to legitimate them- 
selves at the bar of reason. It is said with truth that 
arguments must be used in persuading the heathen to 
accept Christianity, and with unbelievers. But there 
is little promise of success in the promulgation of the 
Gospel, unless a moral feeling can be reached, or a sense 
of moral need aroused. The missionary must expose 
the inadequacy of the heathen system to satisfy neces- 
sities and aspirations of human nature, and, on the 
contrary, must point out the adaptedness of Christiani- 
ty to this end. He will make no headway unless he 
can reach needs that are below the region of mere in- 
tellectual debate. The greatest teacher of natural re- 
ligion among the heathen, Socrates, unlike the So- 
phists, appealed to moral intuitions. St. Paul at 
Athens aims to awaken a consciousness of the unwor- 
thy and unsatisfying character of heathen worship, 
and to point out to his hearers the God whom they 
were feeling after, and blindly seeking; the Being 
whom even then they ignorantly worshiped. 

The Scriptures exhort us, indeed, to be ready to 
give a reason for the ‘hope that is in us. But the 
prime corrective of error they make to be a moral one. 
“Tf thine eye be single,”—thy inmost motive or aim be 


49 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


right,—“ thy whole body shall be full of light ” (Matt. 
vi. 22). “ Every one that loveth : . . knoweth 
God.” (1 John iv. 7.) The “wisdom of the world”— 
Greek philosophy and speculation—had not given a 
knowledge of God. Divine things are “spiritually dis- 
cerned,” ‘‘He that is spiritual judgeth all things.” (1 
Cor. i. 21, ii. 14, 15). “The sheep hear his voice.” 
(John x. 3). The prayer of Paul is that the Philippian 
Christians may grow in love, and, by that means, in 
“knowledge and in all judgment,’”—the knowledge of 
principles and the perception of their practical appli- 
cations. (Phil. i. 9). : 
The foregoing remarks on the relation of faith and 
reason suggest two observations. The first is that 
about every great Christian truth there is a debatable 
ground. A definition is to be given; the bond of con- 
nection between the truth supposed and other related 
Christian truths is to be sought; a place is to be found 
for it in the general sum of our knowledge. All this 
work of accurate conception and explanation consti- 
tutes an open field for differences to arise among those 
who concur in the main thing. Two maps of the same 
country will seldom, if ever, exactly agree. There are 


the same great rivers, the same mountains, the same 


cities, the same grand divisions; but the boundaries 
and locations will not precisely coincide. Now, where 


the line is to be drawn between the truth itself and 


oe. ‘. ; 
4 Mab Oe asia“ ae e 
- as <y se : 

Tee eee aig Oe eho tants of ) eT. tere (er Ar See 


DEBATABLE GROUND. 43 


this debatable province, it may not be always easy to 
determine. You might draw it in one place, and I in 
another. One may hold that more is revealed respect- 
ing a truth than another is able to allow. One may 
see implications which another does not admit. One 
may identify with a truth his own particular concep- 
tion, or philosophy respecting it, and become narrow 
and intolerant. Another may err on the side of lati- 
tudinarian vagueness, may leave the truth in a haze 
where nothing distinct is seen. A passion for definite- 
ness, a passion for completeness, impatience of difficul- 
ties, the exigencies of a system, have led men to atten- 
uate a truth, or else to exaggerate or distort it. All 
I wish to assert here is that in connection with a great 
religious truth there is room for diversity of definition, 
exposition, defence. 

It is one of the wise cautions which Lord Bacon 
gives to theologians that they should not attach the 
same authority to “ inferences as to principles.” “ For 
it cannot but open men’s eyes,” he says, “to see that 
many controversies do merely pertain to that which is 
either not revealed or positive, and that many others 
do grow upon weak and obscure inferences and deriva- 
tions.” * : 

The second observation has to do with the limit of 
the believer’s responsibility in relation to difficulties 


* De Augmentis, b. ix. Advancement of Learning, b. ii. 


A4 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


and objections brought against the articles of the . 
Christian faith. When we assert that a truth has qa 
mysterious side, we absolve ourselves from answering 


ees ee 


that class of attacks and objections which presuppose 
the contrary. Religious truth has practical relations. 
It is largely on these that its verification rests. In 
many of the concerns of life, we feel justified in leaving 
theoretical difficulties to take care of themselves. We ag 
rely upon the test of experience. Then, it is always 
to be kept in mind that many of the problems of theo- 


-€ 


b ’ 
. } ‘ { t . . 
Sing et ace ee coe de ht ie Sty yet eee 
ARE RS co ene eS ag eS OPE Se ra Men Tee tear nee 


logy are equally problems of philosophy. The Chris- 
_ tian believer is no more bound to clear them up than 
any other man. Also, many features of revealed truth 
are strictly analogous to facts in the divine adminis- 
tration of the world, which are patent and undeniable. 
Whether the Christian truth be explicable or not, — 
therefore, it stands on a level, as regards the objection 
to its reasonableness, with conceded, unquestionable 
facts. This analogy reduces the assailant to silence, 
Let him transfer his quarrel with Christian truth to a 
stubborn antagonist—the constitution and course of 
the world. Here is the problem of liberty and neces- 
sity. It emerges in theology, and confronts us in con- 
nection with several essential truths of Christianity. 
But it crops out equally in the study of history, the _ 
moment we see that history is not a chaotic succession 
of unconnected events, and in the concerns of daily 


THE BELIEF IN GOD. AB 


life. Let the objector to Christian truth solve it, if he 
can, for himself. It is purely a work of supereroga- 
tion when the Christian believer goes out to satisfy 
inquirers or opponents as to truth, whatever perplexi- 
ties belong to it, which they assume in their habitual 
judgments, and act upon in their daily conduct. 


In the light of the foregoing discussion, let me 
rapidly pass in review several of the leading truths of 
religion. 

What are the sources of our belief in God? First, 
this belief stands in a close relation to the operations 
of conscience. I hear in my soul a mandate, as from 
a Superior. It is holy, and this inspires the belief 
that holiness—a holy will and preference—charac- 
terize its unseen Source. Blame, approbation, shame, 
which ensue upon obedience or transgression, are feel- 
ings which are “correlative with persons.” Says a 
profound writer, from whom I have before quoted: 
“Tf, as is the case, we feel responsibility, are ashamed, 
are frightened, at transgressing the voice of con- 
science, this implies that there is One to whom we are 
responsible, before whom we are ashamed, whose 
claims upon us we fear. If, on doing wrong we feel 
the same tearful, broken-hearted sorrow which over- 
whelms us on hurting a mother; if, on doing right, 
we enjoy the same serenity of mind, the same sooth- 


46 | FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ing, satisfactory delight which follows on our receiving ae 
praise from a father, we certainly have within us the _ 
image of some person, to whom our love and venera-— % 
tion look, in whose smile we find our happiness, for 
whom we yearn, towards whom we direct our plead- 
ings, in whose anger we are troubled, and waste away. 
These feelings are such as require for their cause an 
intelligent being.” . . . . . “‘The wicked flees 
when no man pursueth’; then why does he flee? 
Whence his terror? Who is it that he sees in soli- : 
tude, in darkness, in the hidden chambers of the 
heart?” * Shall we call it an act of reasoning by 
which we arrive at this faith? If so, the process is 
not explicit in consciousness, and it includes but one a a 
step. If it be called reasoning, still it must be borne 
in mind that the principle of cause and effect does not 
spring up in consciousness, in its abstract form, but is 5 
reached by comparison and generalization. As a 
matter of fact, we pass from one concrete to another 
in making inferences. The assumption on which we 
proceed is latent. But I prefer to consider the 
thought of God and belief in God, which sponta- 
g neously arise in connection with the feelings of con- 
science, as analogous to the recognition of unseen 
objects in the outward world, which is conditioned on 
the multiform impressions of sense. God reveals Him- 


* Grammar of Assent, pp. 105, 106. 


THE BELIEF IN GOD. 47 


~“ 


self to the soul in these voices within it. Let it be 
observed here that if the emotions of conscience are 
subtracted, if conscience be lifeless, the antecedents 
of faith have vanished. ‘The case is like that of one 
whose organs of sense are paralyzed, to whom, there- 
fore, external things do not reveal themselves. 

The second source of our belief in God is closely 
connected with the one just named. It is the sense of 
dependence, which finds no object to rest upon in the 
outward world. From the world I distinguish myself, 
thereby attaining to self-consciousness. The outward 
world acts on me, and awakens in me the feeling of 
dependence; but I act upon it, I am conscious of my- 
self as distinct from it, and cannot ascribe my being 
to it; and thus the sense of dependence spontaneously 
finds its correlate in the infinite Person, who thus 
reveals His existence, at the same time that in con- 
science He reveals His holy authority. 
~ But the soul tends to God, is drawn to Him as the 
ground of rest, and the satisfying good. Hear the 
outcry of the human spirit, when the sense of com- 
munion with Him is clouded! ‘As the hart panteth 
after the water-brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, 
O God! My soul thirsteth for God, for the living 
God.” The soul believes in that which it thirsts for, 
not by framing an argument, although an argument 
could be framed out of this very feeling, but immedi- 


48 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ately—or, rather, implicitly. The hart believes that 
there are water-brooks; otherwise he would not seek 
them. It is a wise word of Pascal that he who seeks 
for God implies, and may know, that God is. But if 
there were a hart which never felt thirst, he would 
not believe in cooling water. It is not at broken 
cisterns which can hold no water, it is only at one 
fountain, that man can slake his otherwise insatiable 
thirst for a sufficient good. 

But, one may ask, does not the design evident in 
nature prove that there is aGod? The argument from 
design is a valid one, and is not shaken by recent dis- 
coveries in science. But this argument presupposes 
that [am myself a free intelligence. If what I call 


freedom in myself, by which I make and carry out a 


plan or pursue an end, is delusive, and if all my own 
purposes are really the product of blind, impersonal 
agency, then the world may spring from the same 
cause, and the argument of design is undermined. 
But how can I demonstrate my own freedom as a per- 
son? It is a fact of consciousness, but it admits of no 
proof. Then, we know that many, in these days es- 
pecially, who come in contact, in their daily studies, 
with what strike us as marks of design, are. not 
convinced of theism. They have another interpreta- 
tion to attach to the phenomena spread out before us. 
Unless there be a prior faith, germinant at least, 


~< 


a 


THE BELIEF IN GOD. 49 


engendered in the soul from the sources already point- 
ed out, the naturalist may travel through the visible 
creation without discovering God. 

I have now to add that an act of will enters into 
faith. There is a choice involved in it. 

I believe with Julius Muller that “the holding fast 
to the personal God and to the inviolability of con- 
science, is an act of the soul, conditioned on a living 
sense of the supreme worth of this conviction.” Sup- 
pose yourself tempted to do a wrong. Let it be a case, 
like the secret withdrawing of property from one who 
can afford to lose it, and will never miss it; a case 
where no visible harm is to ensue. Immense loss, per- 
haps the ruin of your prospects for this world and of 


_ the happiness of those dear to you, impends, if you re- 


fuse. Why not do it? Nothing stands in the way 
but a feeling, which the tempter pronounces an un- 
practical scruple—a sentiment—perhaps, an accident 
of inheritance. Is it not foolish to throw away the 
kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, for so 
intangible, unsubstantial a reason? You have to 
choose. You throw yourself on the side of the right. 


You decide for the feeling, against the arithmetic of 


consequences, against seeming expediency. You feel on 


the instant that in losing your life, you have saved it 


that you have found your true self: you can now enter 
into the joy of heroic souls when, with a noble reck- 
3 


50 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. / 


lessness, they fling away life and all for a sacred cause, 


But when you decide to abide by the right, come what 
will, it is a kind of venture. The act would lose its 


charm for yourself, if this voluntary element were 


taken out of it, if you took no risk, if you could de- 
monstrate by a mathematical argument that which 
you know and feel. Hqually is it true that the mind 
is not coerced into a belief in God. Yet we feel that 
to surrender this belief would be to enervate conscience, 
chill every holy aspiration, and bring desolation into 
the soul. It is true that as regards both the inviolable 
authority of conscience, and faith in God, we can show 
that the abandonment of these convictions is fatal to 
the higher life of man, and to the order and well-being 
of society. But this argument, while it corroborates, 
will not create, belief. 


The future life, immortality, is a truth of faith. Be- 
lief in it is closely connected with belief in God. He 
is not the God of the dead, but of the living. The soul 
that communes with Him finds in this very relation— 
in the sense of its own worth implied in this relation— 
the assurance that it is not to perish at the dissolution 
of its material organs. Its life is consciously at a 
heaven-wide elevation above that of the brute; its 
destiny is proportionately higher. Whoever, with the 
philosopher Kant, contemplates with admiration the 


y 
AN 
q 
< 
i# 
+ 


IMMORTALITY. 4 Al 


starry heavens above him, and the moral law within 
him,-—that law which reveals his connection with a spiri- 
tual order not less vast and incomprehensible than the 
material universe of which he sees himself to be so in- 
significant a part; whoever is thus overwhelmed at 
once with a sense of his littleness and greatness, and 
stands in awe before his own soul; whoever, with 
Pascal, takes in the immensity of the physical universe 
compared with which the little portion of matter which 
makes up his body is a drop in the ocean, while at the 
same moment he remembers that his thought com- 
passes all this physical magnificence; whoever is capa- 
ble of reflections like these, will, in certain moods at 
least, expect to survive death. In proportion as the 
moral and religious nature is roused to activity do we 
know ourselves for what we are, distinct from, and 
superior to, the physical organism through which we 
act, and which reacts upon us. We are made vividly 
conscious of belonging to a different order of things. 
““But how do you wish us to bury you?’ said Crito to 
Socrates. ‘Just as you please,’ he answered, ‘if you 
only get hold of me and do not let me escape you.’ 
And quietly laughing and glancing at us, he said: ‘I 
cannot persuade Crito, my friends, that this Socrates, 
who is now talking with you, and laying down each 
one of these propositions, is my very self; for his mind 
is full of the thought that Jam he whom he is to see 


52 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


in a little while as a corpse; and so he asks how he 

shall bury me.’”* A life of sense lacks this conscious-_ 
ness, and is thus without the attendant evidence of the 
soul’s nature and destiny. Conscience is a prophet. 

Both by its promises and its forebodings, it testifies to 

an existence hereafter. ‘The dread of something 

after death,” which implies that we are to survive 

death, is a solemn fact in human consciousness, with 

which poets, and philosophers, and all who scan human 

_ nature, are familiar. But this prediction within us we 

are under no compulsion to credit. If we give heed 

to it, it is an act of faith. There is a voice in the 

heart which denies the assertions of unbelief. 


“Tf e’er, when faith had fall’n asleep, 
I heard a voice, ‘ Believe no more,’ 
And heard an ever-breaking shore 
That tumbled in the Godless deep ; 


A warmth within the heart would melt 
The freezing reason’s colder part, 
And like a man in wrath, the heart 


Stood up and answered, ‘I have felt.’” 


oars + sg a < yikes ¥ A ~ . ‘ 
de ae BB Ea Oe a ae 4 an old MELE eee re pee Di Oe ain 
Se : ahi = 44 ee tw a GR ae be ies OCR, Boje bind ioe 


The same poet, after singing the praise of know-. 
ledge: | a 
“Who loves not knowledge? Who shall rail a 

Against her beauty ”—— 


* Pheedo, 115. ; San 4 


: THE TRINITY. 3 


goes on to say :— 


“ Half-grown as yet, a child and vain, 
She cannot fight the fear of death. 
What is she, cut from love and faith, 


But some wild Pallas from the brain 


Of Demons? fiery hot to burst 

All barriers in her onward race 

For power. Let her know her place; 
She is the second, not the first.” | 


Let us turn to the doctrine of the Trinity. It is 
often alleged that this doctrine is not affirmed in the 
Bible, that it is not intelligible, that it is not practical. 
All this, as orthodox theologians concede, is, in a cer- 
tain sense, true. The Bible presents us only with the | 
disjecta membra of the doctrine. It teaches, from be- 
ginning to end, that there is only one God. But it 
tells us that the Father is God, that the Son is God, 
and that the Spirit is God. And it teaches that they 
are not altogether the same, but that each is distin- 
guishable from the others severally. The sameness does 
not interfere with the otherness, and the otherness 
does not destroy the sameness. The term “ Trinity” 
is a hieroglyph. It stands for several disconnected 
propositions, collectively taken. It is an algebraic sign 
for an unknown, mysterious relation. By this term 
we bring several separate truths into juxtaposition, 
and thus parry the inference that in afirming one we 


5A FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


are denying another. Without some caveat, it might 
be rashly inferred that, when we say that the Son is 
uncreated, we give up the truth of the unity of God. 
The word “ person” in the formula denotes an obscure, 
incomplete conception. As Augustine says, “ three 
persons are spoken of, not in order to express the 
truth, but in order not to keep silence respecting it.” 
*“T could wish them,” says John Calvin, that is, the 


words “ Trinity of persons,” “ to be buried in oblivion, 


provided this faith were universally received, that the 
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are the one God; and 
that nevertheless the Son is not the Father, nor the 
Spirit the Son, but that they are distinguished from 


each other by some property. I am not so rigidly pre- 


cise as to be fond of contending for mere words.”’+ 
But there are those who cannot endure the mystery. 
They cannot put up with an obscure, undefined idea. 
They forget that even if we say nothing of the Trinity, 
it is not possible for us -to find out the Almighty to 
perfection, or even our own souls. ‘‘ When Eunomius, 
the heretic,” writes old Thomas Fuller, “ vaunted that 
he knew God and His divinity, St. Basil gravels him 
in twenty-one questions about the body of a pismire.”’ 
The Sabellian first comes forward to cut the knot 
which he cannot untie. He reduces “ person” to mani- 


*—“non ut illud diceretur, sed ne taceretur.’’—de Trinit., v. 9. 
+t Institutes, I. xiii. 5. 


ee ne i 
' 


ie 


Ne 


i NT A Si ea alas a 


THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 55 


festation, and starts on a path that leads out either 
into Pantheism, or into the humanitarian conception 
of Christ. The Arian prefers a secondary God, and 
supplants the true doctrine by a crude species of poly- 
theism, with an incarnation attended by most of the 
perplexities, and none of the advantages, of the 
Christian conception. Itis allowed, also, by competent 
theologians—I need to name only Chalmers and Dr. 
Newman—that the Trinity is not a practical truth. 


But they assert, with all emphasis, that the separate 


propositions for which that term stands as a con- 
venient symbol, are, one and all, practical truths. It 
is a practical truth, for example, that there is but 
one God. With that assertion we are to begin. It is 
a practical truth that Christ is the divine Son of God: 
the love of the Father, and of Christ, as discovered in 
the Saviour’s incarnation and death, is contingent on 
it, Itlies in the background of His whole mediatorial 
relation. The Mediator between God and man is not 
a creature, is not as distant from God as we are our- 
selves. The Deliverer of the human race from sin and 
death,’ the author of a new spiritual creation, is not a 
mere man, on the level of Moses and Paul, except as 
He was more successful in resisting temptation. Let 
me say that the Nicene definitions, in giving a certain 
precedence to the Father, while aflirming the true 
divinity of the Son, accord with the teaching of the 


“ey 


~~ Pe 
one 8 
ee “he 
ae at 
4 wy is 
ey 
aft. 
‘ 


56 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


New Testament, and while they do not pretend to clear 
up the inscrutable mystery, are better adapted to re- 
move practical difficulties than many later and less 
authoritative expositions of the subject. The Nicene 
confession: ‘J believe wn one God the Father Al- 
mighty, maker of heaven and earth,” followed, as it is, 
by the assertion of the Saviour’s true and proper 
divinity, corresponds to the solemn affirmation of St. 
Paul, where, having said that the heathen have “ gods 
many and lords many,” he declares: “ but to us there 


as but one God, the Father, of whom are all things,” 


‘and one Lord Jesus Christ by whom are all things.” 
(1 Cor. viii. 5.) In the Athanasian idea, though not 
with any Arian meaning, the Father is first—the fons 


et origo divinitatis. ‘ For the reason,” says Calvin, 


that “the properties in the persons bring with them 
an order, so that in the Father is the beginning and 
cause—principium et origo—as often as mention is 
made of the Father and of the Son together, or of the 
Spirit, the name of God is peculiarly appropriated to 
the Father. In this way the unity of essence is re- 
tained, and the order adhered to, whereby, however, 
nothing is subtracted from the deity of the Son and of 
the Spirit.”* 


Look next at the Christian doctrine of sin. Gin is 


*Institutes, I. xiii. 20. 


é 


THE DOCTRINE OF SIN. 57 


not an attribute of this or that individual exclusively, 
of this or that family, or nation, or generation, but of 
the race of mankind. Yet sin pertains to the funda- 
mental bent or determination of the will; and the will 
we conceive of not as a race attribute, but as strictly 
personal. How can moral evil get into the will, how 
can the will acquire a wrong direction, save by its own 
act? And if it could, how would guilt be involved? 
Here is the problem of sin: the fact of a sin belonging 
to mankind in common; the truth of self-determina- 
tion as essential to the will, and the ground of personal 
responsibility. The Pelagian springs up with his 
notion that the wickedness of the world—which 
renders it necessary that every human being should 
pray, as soon as he knows the meaning of the words, 
“ Forgive us our debts”—is due to bad example, bad 
education. He does not ask what evil example, what our 
corrupt training, spring from. No matter how shal- 
low an explanation may be, if it be only plain and 
consistent! Suppose that we are required to explain 
this seeming contradiction. We are at liberty to 
answer the challenge bluntly, but not unkindly,— 
Explain it yourself! We do not create the facts. 
Christianity takes things as they are. As a matter of 
fact, men do not acquit themselves or one another for 
‘specific wrong-doing, on account of the prevalence of 
sin HS ark. sin of which-that wrong-doing is az 


58 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. — 


effect. Christian teachers go no farther on this sub- 
ject than the wisest heathen have gone. But what 
will you say of infants in whom character is not yet 
developed? The same answer may be rendered. 
There is an imperceptible transition from the moral 
condition of the child, whatever that be, to the char- 
acter that belongs to him as a man. We can point to 
no moment when there was a fall, a conversion to evil. 
The difficulty is not a whit more serious for the Chris- 
tian believer, than for the unbeliever, provided the 
unbeliever does not shut his eyes to the palpable facts 
of human life. The catholic theology has never con- 
cealed its embarrassment on this subject. It has 
persistently refused to be driven to either extreme. 
A mystery overhangs the relation of the individual to 
the race. Christian theology falls back on this mystery. 
It will not bow down before syllogisms the premises of 
which are imperfectly comprehended, but takes its 
stand on the palpable facts, attested by conscience and 
by experience, of a general sin, coupled with personal 
guilt and responsibility, 

Not that inquirers are to be warned off the ground. 
The questions involved in the Christian doctrine of sin 
form a legitimate subject of investigation. Here there 
is a debatable province in which theology has room to 
expatiate. Hypotheses may be broached, theories 
advocated, with a reasonable hope to extend the 


aM 
> 


ef! le ee ey ae 


JP En TE, ER a A 
‘ os a ? - - x 


S xd t. 


THE ATONEMENT. 59 


boundaries of our knowledge, and to reconcile seeming 
contradictions. But care is to be taken not to trench 


on the main substance of the truth in any direction, 


not to confound solutions suggested by human inge- 
nuity with the Christian dogma, and charitably to 


allow diversities of opinion in the wide district open 


to speculation. 


The Atonement is another cardinal truth of Christi- 
anity. It emanates from the love of God; yet there 
is an expiation, not only a proclaiming of peace, but a 
making of peace, a relation to that righteous condem- 
nation of sin in the mind of God which is reéchoed in 
the human conscience. ‘ He loved us,” says Calvin, 
quoting from Augustine, “even when we were in the 
exercise of enmity against Him, and engaged in the 
practice of iniquity. Wherefore, in a wonderful and 
divine manner, He both hated us and loved us at the 
same time.’* Here the theological problem is brought 
before us. The passion for simplification, even if the 
truth has to be pared down, is at once roused. What 
is called the Moral View of the Atonement, when 
advanced as a complete description of it, is an example 
of this tendency. For one, I am thankful for the great 
store of interesting truth which Schleiermacher—I 
name Schleiermacher as incomparably the ablest man 


* Institutes, B. IL., c. xvi. 4. 


60 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


of this class—and others have brought forward upon 


the direct relation of Christ and of His work to man. 
But if the exposition stop here, an element is left out. 


We have had few preachers in this country to equal 
Horace Bushnell; a man of genius, whose religious 
thoughts came to him in flashes of light, which 
may have sometimes had the effect to hinder him, for 
the time, from seeing their needed complement. He 
presented the Moral View of the work of Christ in an 
extensive treatise, with remarkable eloquence and 
felicity of illustration. Yet he appears to have been 
conscious of a defect, and he set about to repair it in a 
later Essay, in which he sought to find a place for a 
reflex influence of the humiliation and death of Christ 
upon the offended feeling of God, not otherwise to be 
appeased. I say nothing of the special character of 
this later speculation; I speak of it only as indicating 
an uneasy sense of the insufficiency of the Moral View, 
in the mind of one of its ablest expounders. Mr. 
James Martinean entitles an Essay in which he attacks 
the doctrine of the Atonement, “ Mediatorial Religion.” 


The issue may well be made on the validity, or inva- _ 


lidity, of the conception involved in this title. Bishop 
Butler has illustrated the consonance of the doctrine 
of salvation by a Mediator with the analogies of expe- 
rience. Who doubts, let me ask, the reasonableness of 


intercessory prayer? But all intercessory prayer pro- 


agieia 


THE ATONEMENT. 61 


ceeds on the assumption that the supplication of one 
may obtain for another from God a good which might 
be withheld without it. Here is mediation in one 
form, universally recognized wherever there is piety 
among men. What if Christ qualified Himself to be 
the Intercessor by actually partaking of our penal lot, 
thereby realizing in consciousness both the feeling of 
God in view of the wrong inflicted on him, and the 
guilt and distress of man under the displeasure of his 
Maker? What if His intercession procures a boon, 
not otherwise to be obtained, from the love and mercy 
of God? Where is the absurdity in the supposition ? 
If death be the wages of sin, as the Bible declares in 
words that find a response in the consciences of men, 
how can this particular quality or significance of death 
fail to enter, as a constituent element, into the experi- 


~~ ence of the dying Saviour? If just displeasure against 


an offender is mitigated in us by the suffering of an- 


other in his behalf, why, according to the same myste- 


rious law, may it not be so with God? In theology 


alone, are we to be debarred from admitting facts until 
they shall be completely reduced to science ? 

On this subject of the Atonement there is abundant 
space for theological inquiry and debate, and room for 
differences of opinion. But here, too, the aim must 
be to preserve intact the essential elements of the 
truth which are correlative to the needs of the soul. 


- 62 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


Better to adjourn the explication to a brighter day 
than to sacrifice practical truth to the exigencies of a 
system, or to espouse a one-sided theory simply be- 
cause it is easy. - 


The influence exerted by the Spirit of God upon 
the soul is mysterious as to its mode; but not at all 
more mysterious than forms of personal influence 
where one mind is swayed by another, with which 
all are familiar. On the first promulgation of the 
Gospel, the doctrine of the influence of the Holy Spirit 
excited no difficulty. The general idea was one 
recognized by the heathen as probable. As to a clash- 
ing of this truth with the freedom of the will, we 
know that a particular evil habit may cling to one so 


obstinately that there is no help for the subject of it, coll 


except from without. Some new power must come in 
to inspire and fortify his resolve. He is practically 
helpless, Yet he is all the time responsible for his 
habit; and unless he can be emancipated from it, it 
will bring upon him, as all perceive, moral ruin. The 
same thing is often true of a community which is 
addicted to a particular vice, or is sunk low in the 
general tone of its principles and conduct. The 
means of escape must come, if at all, from some 
exterior influence. The guilty agents are also victims; 
they cannot lift themselves up to a higher plane: they 


THE SCRIPTURES. 63 


must be lifted up. A fresh breeze must blow upon 
them to purify the moral atmosphere. A new power 
must enter into them, and revive the smothered prin- 
ciple of virtue. In connection with the truth of the 
influence of the Spirit, emerges the old question of 
liberty and necessity. Why should the Christian 
believer be held accountable for clearing up a diffi- 
culty, which has not only been a subject of incessant 
debate in the schools, but likewise meets us equally in 
the daily conduct of life? He may have his theory, as 
any other may, or he may have none. This is a 
private affair of his own. He acknowledges no deeper 
mystery than thoughtful men are obliged to find at 
every turn. The Christian preacher tells one who 
longs to escape from sin: Pray as if it all depended 
on God; strive as if it all depended on yourself. To 
the logical difficulty that is raised by this counsel, he 
is not bound to render an answer. That is a question 
of science. Solve the seeming contradiction as you 
will, experience proves, in multitudes of cases, that 
this injunction occasions no practical perplexity. It is 
~ acted on, and with the best result. ‘ 


A few words may now be said on the doctrine of 
the Scriptures, which are the rule of our faith and 
conduct. We touch here on a subject which, at the 
present day, excites the attention of inquisitive minds 


64 FAITH AND RATIONALISM, — 


without and within the Church. The more searching a 7 
study of the Bible, and the progress of knowledge in 
other departments, especially in history and in natural 


re ee 
“te 
~ £29 


and physical science, have brought up new inet os 
which those who believe in Christianity and revere the Be 
Bible, yet do not pin their faith on tradition, have to ‘a 
consider with candor and patience. The first thing to aa . 
be said is, that no one is competent to interpret thes a 
Scriptures, who cannot enter, with a living sympathy, ; 
into their spirit. I might add that one who stands cS 
outside of the Book, as it were, with no insight into 
its moral and religious contents, is disabled from — 4 
judging one branch of the evidence relative to external - 
questions of date and authorship. Suppose a man 
who is devoid of poetic feeling, but is sharp in geogra- , 
phy and statistics, to undertake the criticism of a 
Shakespeare. He will observe that Hamlet studies at q 
Wittenberg long before that university was founded, a 
that Bohemia is furnished with a sea-coast, the scene 
of a shipwreck, that Hector quotes Aristotle at the 
siege of Troy, and that Ajax Telamon is confounded 
with Ajax Oileus. But the boundless store of | 
thought and of beauty, scattered in almost reckless a 
profusion upon the pages of his author, the mere a 5 
plodder will scarcely discern. The qualities which are 
requisite in a critic of the Bible are parallel with 4 
such as everybody thinks essential in poetry, in the ba 


THE SCRIPTURES. 65 


fine arts generally, in every department where some- 
thing is required beyond mere keenness and informa- 
tion. An unreligious critic will not get through the 
shell of the Bible. The “earthen vessels” in which, 
as the Apostle says, the treasure is hidden, he may 
scan, and detect every crack and blemish, but the 
treasure which they enclose, will escape him. On 
questions of chronology, on questions of history even, 
where his bias against the supernatural does not 
vitiate his reasoning, he may shed light. His in- 
vestigations, if pursued in a truly scientific spirit, 
_ will have their value. But beyond a restricted field, 
his judgments may be wholly at fault. 

Let me advert to one or two illustrations of the 
directly opposite judgments that may be pronounced 
upon the same books of Scripture. Mr. J. 8. Mill 
refers in quite disparaging terms, in his Essays on 
Religion, to the Gospel of John, and especially to the 
discourses reported in it. The foremost of the Re- 
formers, whom Mr. Mill himself would consider a very 
able man, speaks of the same book as “ the chief Gos- 
pel,” can hardly find words strong enough to express 
his delight in it; and the long discourse in the final 
chapters he characterizes as the “best and most com- 
forting which the Lord Jesus uttered on earth,” as “a 
treasure and a jewel,” which the wealth of the world 
could not balance. Nowhere else, he says, are the 


66 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


principal articles of the Christian faith so powerfully 

set forth. Niebuhr, a man of most vigorous intellect 
—and he is but one out of an uncounted number who 
have shared in the same conviction—clung to this 
Gospel with an intense love. Why do the contents of 
a book which address these minds with such an irre- 
sistible fascination, seem “poor stuff” to a writer whose 
judgments in certain departments of literature are far 
from being contemptible? It is because he is out of 
his element.. The book of which he speaks in so slight- 
ing a tone lies without the circle of thought and expe- 
rience in which he is at home. It is only another case 
where the critic really judges himself. Because he 
sees nothing, he infers that nothing is to be seen. 
One who should pronounce an oratorio of Handel, or 
the symphonies of Beethoven, ‘poor stuff,” would sim- 
ply prove that he had no ear for music, or that his 
exceptionally feeble sensibility in that direction had 
been left undeveloped. A man who should character- 
ize the Madonnas of Raphael as daubs might be an 


authority in political economy, but mistakes his calling 


in assuming the réle of a critic in Art. A cultivated 


author, who is of the school called “free religionists,” 
in a recent work on the life of Christ, makes a remark 


to the effect that the Epistles to the Romans and to — 
the Galatians are, for the most part, ‘intellectually arid _ am 
and devoid of human interest.” But these writings, ae 


‘ 


THE EPISTLES OF PAUL. 67 


more than any other single-cause, made the Protestant 
Reformation. What a flame they kindled in the soul of 
Luther! The renewed study of these short tracts con- 
vulsed Europe. Ata later day, John Bunyan, after de- 
scribing the remorse, and dread, and sorrow for sin, 
which had long tortured him, says: “Well, after many 
such longings in my mind, the God in whose hands are 
all our days and ways, did cast into my hand one day 
a book of Martin Luther; it was his comment on the 
Galatians; it, also, was so old that it was ready to fall 
from piece to piece if I did but turn it over.” After 
reading but a little way, he says: ‘I found my condi- 
tion, in his experience, so largely and profoundly han- 
- dled, as if his book had been written out of my heart.” 
This insight on the part of his author amazed Bunyan. 
“T do prefer,” he adds, “this book of Martin Luther 
upon the Galatians before all the books that ever I 
have seen, as most fit for a wounded conscience.” 
John Wesley, after suffering long-continued anxieties 
of feeling on account of sin, and from want of faith in 
Christ, attended, on a certain evening, a meeting where 
a person read Luther’s preface to the Hpistle to the 
Romans, in which the Reformer dwells on the nature 
of faith, and the peace that arises from it. That pas- 
sage infused an altogether new trust and joy into 
Wesley’s heart. That moment was a turning-point in 
his career. Methodism must be allowed to be a sub- 


68 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


stantial fact. When revolutions in personal character, 
and mighty changes in the course of history, not in 
one age only, but in a long succession of ages, are 
directly traceable to certain books, has not the critic 


who finds in them little that is remarkable, some reason — 


to suspect that the fault is in himself? May there not 
reside in them a power which, for some reason, he is 
not competent to discern ? 

The second remark which I have to make is that in 
the discussion of this grave subject, a discussion which 
is certain to be carried forward hereafter with even 
more interest than it excites now, the defenders of the 
Gospel have to guard against the intrusion of a 
Rationalistic tendency into their conception of the 


Scriptures and of Inspiration. We may safely say ~ 


that the distress of mankind, considered in connection 


with what natural religion discloses of the character 


of God, affords some ground for expecting a Revelation. 
At least, we are debarred from pronouncing a Revela- 
tion impossible, and are reasonably required to attend 
to the pretensions of a system that has the obvious and 
acknowledged excellence of Christianity. But every- 
thing warns us to be cautious about going too far on 
the a@ priori road. Things, in a thousand particulars, 


are not what we might have expected them to be. | 


The Roman Catholic theologian argues a priori for the 
authority of the Church, and now for the infallibility 


‘ 
“a 
c 

e 

5 ag 
4 
y 


a 


THE METHOD OF REVELATION. 69 


of the Pope, from the need of an unerring interpreter 
to remedy the infirmities of human reason—an umpire 
at hand to end the strife. Will not the benevolent 
Being who gave the Revelation provide a living guide 
for the understanding of it, a safeguard against cor- 
ruption, and against endless controversies about its 
meaning ? 

From these confident anticipations in regard to what 
God will do, I turn with satisfaction to the discreet 
utterances of Butler : 

“ As we are in no sort judges beforehand, by what 


laws or rules, in what degree or by what means, it 


were to have been expected that God would naturally,” 
—i.e., by the use of our natural powers—“ instruct us ; 
so upon supposition of His affording us light and in- 
struction by revelation, additional to what He has af- 
forded us by reason and experience, we are in no sort 
judges, by what methods, and in what proportion, it 
were to be expected that this supernatural light and 
instruction would be afforded us.” We know not be- 
forehand,” Butler proceeds to say, ‘‘ what knowledge 
God would afford men by natural means, what power 
or disposition they would have to communicate it, 
what sort of evidence it would rest upon, whether or 
not it would be equally clear to all; whether reason, 
thé power of apprehending it, would be given at once, 
or gradually.” “In like manner,” he goes on to say, 


4 


TO FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


“we are wholly ignorant what degree of new know- 
ledge it were to be expected God would give mankind 
by revelation, upon supposition of His affording one; 
or in how far, or in what way, He would interpose 
miraculously to qualify them, to whom He should 
originally make the revelation, for communicating the 
knowledge given by it; and to secure their doing it to 
the age in which they should live, and to secure its 
being transmitted to posterity. We are equally ig- 
norant . .. . whether the scheme would be revealed 
at once, or unfolded gradually. Nay, we are not in 
any sort able to judge whether it were to have been 
expected, that the Revelation should have been com- 
mitted to writing ; or left to be handed down, and con- 
sequently corrupted, by verbal tradition, and at length 


sunk under it, if mankind so pleased, and during such 


time as they are permitted, in the degree they evident- 
ly are, to act as they will.” “And thus we see that 
the only question concerning the truth of Christianity 
is, whether it be a real revelation ; not whether it be 
attended with every circumstance which we should 
have looked for: and, concerning the authority of 


Scripture, whether it be what it claims to bes:-notme 


whether it be a book of such sort, and so promulged 
as weak men are apt to fancy a book containing a di- 
vine revelation should.” This wise theologian appeals 
to our experience as regards the knowledge imparted 


<a 


THE GOSPEL HISTORIES. ek 


by nature and our own faculties, to prove that “ upon 
supposition God should afford men some additional in- 
struction by revelation, it would be with circum- 
stances, in manners, degrees, and respects, which we 
should be apt to fancy we had great objections against 
_ the credibility of.”* We find nature to be different 
from what we should have expected; why not Reve- 
lation? Is it not better to humbly inquire what God » 
has actually done? We may find reasons afterward 
for His procedure which would not have occurred to us 
beforehand. The reasoning of Butler is a protest 
against orthodox, as well as heterodox, Rationalism. 
Even on the low ground of policy, with regard to the 
most feasible means of repelling assaults upon Christi- 
anity, the humbler path of investigation and of taking 
things as they are, is, in the long run, the most prudent. 
Find out what is tenable, and what is not; waste no 
strength in trying to hold indefensible positions ; con- 
centrate your forces at the main points: these are ac- 
cepted maxims in military art. 

To test the justice of Butler’s teaching, I will ask 
each one to carry himself back to the moment when 
Christ, having risen from the dead, bade adieu to His 
disciples. Shut the book of history now, and tell me 
what that chosen band will do? What will God do to 
preserve and transmit the knowledge which they are 


* Analogy, P. IL, c. ili. 


72 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


possessed of, and to provide for its due authentication ? - 


Should we not suppose that the Hleven would at once 
assemble, that each of them would recall what he could 
of the Master’s words and acts, that they would to- 
gether make up a full, consecutive narrative, sign it, 


attest it by a solemn united affidavit, cause copies to. 


be multiplied by careful transcription, and provide for — = 


their being handed down to those who were to come 
after? Had this been done, how different a thing 
what we call “the Evidences of Christianity ” would 


be! Had the conrse described been actually pursued, — 23 


we should certainly have a priori arguments in abund- 


ance to demonstrate that no other course was to be ex- __ 


pected, and that no other would be worthy of God. _ a 
How different is the fact from the probable human an- 
ticipation! Three out of five of the histories in the 
New Testament are written by persons who were not 
Apostles. One of them in his old age, brings together 
precious recollections of his Master; embracing, how- 


ever, but a small fraction of what He said and did. 3 * 
One other, at an earlier date, makes up a brief report 


of discourses, or of discourses and historical memoran- 
da connected with them. The two other narrators re- 
cord what they can gather up from Apostles and others” = 
who knew Jesus. One of them writes for the benefit 
of an individual. I deny not that there was a wise. 


Providence in all this. There was a wise and vigilant — 3 


THE GOSPEL HISTORIES. to 


Providence ; and I believe that the proof of Christian- 
ity is stronger than it would have been under the sup- 
position made above. Imagine the objections that 
would be raised, had the Gospel history been framed 
in the set way just described! “ Here was a conclave 
of the Apostles,” it would be said. “They were com- 
mitted to the cause: their own credit was at stake. 
Who was there to cross-examine them? One or two 
leading ones would carry the rest with them. Very 
likely Peter would be the one to draw up the narrative. 
He could talk down opposition. But what of his trust- 
worthiness? He had told an untruth in denying his 
connection with Christ. If he could falsify on one side, 
he could on the other. Look at his duplicity at An- 
tioch! How he was exposed by Paul! Who were 
the copyists ? What a chance there for alterations!” 
These objections, or others of a piece with them, would 
have been loudly uttered. On the whole, we may be 
satisfied that the Gospel record, though an inestimable 
¥ gift of God, almost appears to have made itself. The 
facts were told here and there, by individuals, each for 
himself, with no collusion or combination. They were 
believed in, and by so many, that written records of 
them were soon called for; so that these present, in an 
artless form, the testimony of eye-witnesses, which 
they had given independently of one another, before 


there wasa thought of committing it to writing, at 
4 


4 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


least as a continuous narrative. On the surface it looks — 


as if these inconceivably precious facts had been it ie 
to take their chance of being written down, and trans- 7 


mitted to later generations. God has chosena method — 


of preserving and diffusing the knowledge of His : 


revelation, which is very different from the method a 
which you and I would have chosen for Him. Herein 
is a rebuke for the presumption which undertakes to 


prescribe the way in which the truth of the Gospel 
must be given and received, and a monition to form 
our opinions on this momentous subject, by a diligent, 
honest, reverent examination of the Bible itself, in the 
light of the verified knowledge which God affords us 


from whatever quarter. 


The authority of the Bible as our guide in religion 
is not an arbitrary dogma. Nor is it reasonable for 
an individual to restrict that authority by the limits e, 


of his own insight, at a particular time, into the truth — 
contained in the Bible. He does not limit, in this 
way, his confidence in any master in human science. 


He takes the position of a learner. He does not 


expect to see into everything in a moment. He takes 
it for granted that there may be a force anda meaning 
which he is not yet far enough advanced to. discern. 


This is true of every branch of knowledge. It is 
eminently true in departments where esthetic percep- _ 
tion comes into play. Nothing more evinces a puerile | s 


HE 


os) 
a 
\ ee 


Btritae 


a 
2 ag 


AUTHORITY OF THE SCRIPTURES. 15 


conceit than the hasty verdicts of uncultivated people 


on great productions in literature and art. It is the 


novice turning teacher. Now the Bible has proved 
itself to be a treasure-house of wisdom and knowledge. 
It does not open up its meaning all at once. It meets 
the soul in every emergency,—in temptation, in be- 
reavement, in disappointment, in the prospect of 
death,—with some life-giving word before unnoticed. 
As one moves through the experiences of human life, 
the reading of the Bible isa constant surprise. In 
every new situation, we hear the voice of one who has 


been there before us. The pages of the Bible—lI dare 


say the simile has been often suggested before—are like — 
sheets written with invisible ink, on which, when 
exposed to the heat, messages of love and warning 
come out in bold, distinct characters. Doctrines of 
the Bible that seemed unintelligible or repulsive, are 
capable of assuming another aspect. And so—to 
quote the familiar words of Bacon, in the Advance- 
ment of Learning—“ we ought not to draw down and 
submit the mysteries of God to our reason, but con- 
trariwise to raise and advance our reason to the divine 

Modern study has brought. into full view the 
human element in the Bible. Its books are redo- 
lent of the country where they were written. They 
are alive with human feeling. The distinctive qual- 


& 


76 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ities of their authors, their intellectual habit, their — B 
personal tone and spirit, their education and circum-— 4 
stances, are reflected in every line. Isaiah is not 
Jeremiah, John is not Paul, and Paul is not James, 4 
The lyrics of David and the Psalmists are not the ~ 
ethics of Solomon and the proverb writers. But, ee ‘ 
however serious may be the task of formulating hea 
doctrine of Inspiration, with reference to the Old — 
Testament and the New, to writings hortatory and 4 
argumentative, to song, and history, and peat a 
several things are evident. One is that through this — 
collection of oes from Genesis to the eee 
‘thro’ the ages,’ 


——“one increasing purpose runs.” 


‘Tt is first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn ce 
in the ear.” ‘ Novum testamentum in vetere latet; ve- 3 3 
tus testamentum in novo patet.” Another thing evi- 
dent is that the fundamental truths of the Christian ~ 
system are imbedded in Scripture too deep to be 
disturbed by varying phases of theory respecting it. | 
The fact of sin, of the estrangement of mankind from — a 
God, the Incarnation and the Atonement, the Mission _ 
and Indwelling of the Spirit, stand upon no ae 
proof-text; they enter into the warp and woof of — - 
Scripture. Another truth on this subject is that, i in a 


all essential things, the Scripture interprets and per- a 


AUTHORITY OF THE SCRIPTURES. Le 


fects itself. The Old Testament is to be read in the 
light of the New. In the Bible there are books 
which are like the main, central organs in the human 
body. Of this character are the Psalms and Isaiah, 


_ the teaching of Christ in the Synoptists, the Gospel 


and First Hpistle of John, the leading Hpistles of 
Paul, especially the Romans and the Galatians. They 
concentrate in themselves the essential spirit of Reve- 
lation; the vital substance of its doctrine. In them 
are contained the criteria for determining the function 
of other portions of inspired Scripture, which, how- 
ever important in their place, may not have an equal 
regulative office. History and doctrine, let me add, 
are linked together. The doctrinal system presupposes 


~ahistory. The prophets in the old dispensation, and 


4s 


the apostles in the new, did not, on a sudden, start up 
from the ground, with no antecedent history to pre- 
pare the way. 


‘The great argument for Christianity is Christianity 


itself. But for the argument to have effect, it must 
be no single member, no isolated feature of the sys- 
tem, that is held up to view. The pure morals of the 
Gospel, the perfect example of Christ, the humane, 
elevating influence of His teaching, the attractive idea 
presented of the character of God,—not either of these 
apart, not even-all of them taken together, suffice to 


a3) Ns FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


give to that argument its overpowering force. We 
must look at all in the light of the one comprehensive 
design of Christianity, We must contemplate the end 
which it undertakes to accomplish. It is nothing less 
than the redemption of mankind from sin and death. 


€ 


As an idea simply, how sublime it is! How infinitely ~ aa 
does it transcend the most daring dream of philogo- i 
phers, moralists, reformers! Not this or that kind 
of sin alone—as misrule, cruelty, impurity, fraud 
—is aimed at; but sin itself is to be extirpated from — 
human nature. Not one kind of distress alone, but 
death, the anticipation of which keeps the guilty heart 
of man all his life-time in bondage to fear, is to be 
stripped of its terror, and made harmless, like a con- — 
‘quered enemy. The whole burden that weighs upon 
mankind is to be lifted off. The recovery of the world 
from the slavery of sin and from its condemnation, to 
the freedom of the children of God—what human 
mind could have even dreamed of such an achievement 
as within the limits of possibility? This is the Gospel, 
the good tidings. Regarded from this point of view, it 
bears on itself the stamp of its divine origin. The De- 
liverer Himself was a man; but He could be no mere 
man. It is credible that he was what He professed to 
be—the Son of God. | 


I bring these remarks to a close. They are little a 


a 


ban 


more than hints which I leave you to follow out for 
: - yourselves, I congratulate you, Gentlemen, that these 


“Tn our profession,” to quote the noble words of 
Robert Hall, “the full force and vigor of the mind 
_ may be exerted on that which will employ it forever; 
‘3 Ee religion, the final centre of repose, the goal to 
which all things tend, which gives to time all its im- 
portance, apart from which man is a shadow, his very 
= existence a riddle, and the stupendous scenes which 
: surround him, as incoherent and unmeaning as the 
- leaves which the Sibyl scattered in the wind.”* 


* Hati’s Works, Vol. II. p. 15%. 


_ 


. oem aealet’s hy iAee rey 

oy Seu aw M i) eh 9 on ; i. 

ft ; ‘ : . 
be < 5 rf hee LES = > eaae a ig bs we, pA rae 
Ss es 3 Mateihs ee ees ons : Pry 2 wale 4 are : 

ee ee 2 Ache eee ey 
oe an ear 8 _-RELIGIO Us STUDIES. . 79 
» 9 a hg 


j inspiring studies are to be your lifelong occupation, 


Ss ov 
* Ve PHN Ss 


APPENDIX. 


~ 


S. 
¢: 


i 


THE TEACHING OF THEOLOGY ON THE MORAL 
BASIS OF FAITH. 


The masters of theology in all ages have generally 
taught that a living faith, as contrasted with an intel- 
lectual assent to propositions whether of fact or of — 
doctrine, springs out of the heart; that the existence 


_ or non-existence of such faith is contingent on the state 


or 


~ 


of the affections and the will; and that, in many 
instances, the only remedy for scepticism of the intel- 
lect is to be found in a change of the moral temper, or 
in an altered bent of the will. 

This is the philosophy of Augustine. But in his 
case, as in the Schoolmen afterwards, the treatment of 
the subject of faith is somewhat confused by the view 
taken of the authority of the Visible Church. Faith 
is partly the loyal acceptance of the Church as the 
authorized and qualified guide, and partly that imme- 
diate sense of the truth and excellence of the Gospel, 


~ and of its adaptedness to the wants of the soul, which 


avails to triumph over all doubts. Augustine began 
83 


84 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


with a restless seeking after God; and in this craving 
for a supernal good, in his view, the religious life in 
sinful men must take its rise. This is a distinctively 
moral feeling, not mere intellectual curiosity. Bat 
tossed as he had been from one opinion to another, he 
felt the need of a present, authoritative voice to still the 
tumult within; and this he recognized in the Catholic 
Church. Here, again, it was not. external criteria 
alone, such as miracles, the succession of bishops in 
the Apostolic sees, and the like, which satisfied. him 
that the Church could be trusted; but it was the : 
victory which he saw that Christianity, as preserved ~~ 
and transmitted in the Church, had gained, in spite of 
all obstacles, in the Roman world, and the ennobling, 
purifying influence which had gone forth from the 
Gospel and the Church upon individual souls and 
upon society. Here, once more, was a moral source of 
conviction. ‘Christianity and the Church,” to quote 
from Neander, “and, indeed, the Church under this 
particular form of constitution, were confounded in his | 
view. What he might justly regard as a witness for — % 
the divine, world-transforming power of the Gospel, 
appeared to him as a witness for the divine authority 
of the visible, universal Church; and he did notcon- 
sider that the Gospel truth would have been able to 
bring about effects equally great, by its inherent 
divine power, in some other vessel in which it could — 


s 
s 
4 


Pe a 


+. 


a a a aa a as 


,2 


= he 


AUGUSTINE ON FAITH. — 85 


have been diffused among mankind; nay, that it 
would have been able to produce still purer and 
mightier effects, had it not been in many ways dis- 
turbed and checked in its operation by the impure 
and confining vehicle of its transmission.” * The 
maxims, Faith precedes knowledge ; Believe that you 
may understand — “ Fides preecedit intellectum;”’ 


b) 


_“Crede, ut intelligas’””—which were adopted by the 
Schoolmen, are found, in these very words, in Augus- 
tine. I believe that I may understand—“ Credo, ut 


’ 


- intelligam”—the noted saying of Anselm, is thus 
almost verbally identical with sentences of the father 
of Latin theology. Although the authority of the 
Church, and, on that ground, the truth of the complex 
system of doctrines which the Church inculcated, were 
held to deserve immediate acknowledgment, yet, as 
we have said above, the intrinsic excellence of the 
Gospel itself, and the love immediately evoked by it 
in the soul, were made prominent as the sources of a 
living faith. The truth, it was held, shines in its own 
light. The practical experience of the Gospel, in its 
enlightening and saving power, was held to be the pre- 
requisite of the intellectual comprehension of it. Iix- 
perience was put first; science afterwards. It was 
Anselm, the first of the eminent medizeval expounders 


of the relation of faith to reason, who said: ‘‘ He who 


* Church History, vol. II. p. 241. 


wali a oa re ae ate Se as ie heats on a es 


aX epi st 


86 | FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


has not believed, has not experienced, and he who has 

not experienced, will not understand.” a 
“ Faith,” says St. Bernard, “is a certain voluntary = 

and assured prelibation of the truth,” not yet made ; 


explicit or reduced to science. The heart anticipates 
the understanding, not waiting for intellectual analysis. < a 
Alexander of Hales says that in religion the relation - ag 
of knowledge and believing is the reverse of that . 
which exists in other sciences, because in religion faith i 
creates the reason; it is the argument which makes 
the reason ; it is the light of the soul—lwmen anima- : 5 
rum—which makes it perspicacious to find out the — e 
reasons by which the things of faith are proved. ~ 
There is an inward certitude, founded on love, or the - 4 
surrender of the heart to the truth, which is distinct - 
from conviction on purely intellectual grounds. Bon- 
aventura, the great doctor of the Franciscans, founds 
the conviction that is in faith, not on logical demon- 
strations, but on love to that which is presented as the - 
object of faith. It is the contents of the truth, not 
external verifications, that carry the assent of the — 
soul. Albert the Great makes religious faith, as dis- 4 
tinguished from theoretical certainty, to be an imme- . 
diate persuasion of the truth, where we are attracted — : 
by the object of faith, in the same manner that the® 
will is determined by the moral law. 


“The merit of faith,” says Hugo of St. Victor 4 


SE RIE Seg eS 


THE REFORMERS ON FAITH. 87 


- “eonsists in the fact that our conviction is determined 


by the affections, when no adequate knowledge is yet 
present. By faith, we render ourselves worthy of 
knowledge, as perfect knowledge is the final reward of 
faith in the life eternal.” William of Paris separates 
that faith which springs from a rational knowledge of 


the object, an intellectual comprehension, from that 


which springs from the virtue of the believer, or his 
temper of heart. He speaks of a “ fortitude which 


overcomes the darkness of incoming doubt, and by its 


own light scatters the clouds of unbelief.’’* 

The Reformers, while discarding the Scholastic 
doctrine of the authority of the Church, were pene- 
trated with the conviction that a living faith has an 


immediate source deeper than the understanding. As 


to the existence of God, Calvin says: “We lay it 
down as a position not to be controverted that the 
human mind, even by natural instinct, possesses some 
sense of a Deity.” ‘The minds of men are fully pos- 


) 


sessed with this common principle ’””—the sense of 
religion — “ which is closely interwoven with their 
original composition.” He speaks of our “ propensity 
to religion,’ of the “innate persuasion’’ which men 
have of the divine existence, a persuasion inseparable 


from their very constitution ;’ a perception which sin 


* On the Religious Philosophy of the Schoolmen, see Neander, 
Church History, vol. iv., p. 367 seq. 


88 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


has never wholly extinguished. ‘No man can take a 
survey of himself but he must immediately turn to 
the contemplation of God, in whom he ‘lives and 
moves ’; since it is evident that the talents which we 
possess are not from ourselves, and that our very exis- 
tence is nothing else but a subsistence in God alone.”* 

Melanchthon, the author of the principal doctrinal 
treatise in the Lutheran Church, says, on the same 
subject: “God desires to be known and worshiped ; 
and the clear and sure knowledge of God would have 
flashed upon the mind of men, had human nature re- 
mained sound.” Now the minds of men wander “ in 
a great and gloomy mist, inquiring whether there be 
a God, whether there be a Providence, and what is the 
will of God.” + 

Faith, as is well known, is a great theme with Lu- 
ther. That the source of inward certitude with re- 


spect to religious truth, does not lie in the understand- 


ing, but in the relation of that truth to the appeten- — 
cies of the soul, is asserted in every variety of form. 
Take out this general idea from Luther’s discussions 
of the subject, and no Luther would be left. He plants 
himself upon the Word of God, but it is to the con- 
science and heart that the Word comes home 
with power. The understanding, left to itself, is a 
blind and false guide. No words are too strong for 


* Institutes, B. I., i. 1., iii. 1, 2,3. + Loci Theol., de Deo. 


ar. ae 4 wr it de Oe. 
1+ he ee 
7-72 tae PONS ne “a4 


sgt ge 
; 


2: 


- 


fe 


Nhe At eae 


ae > SR Se 


PASCAL ON FAITH AND REASON. §9 


Luther to express his scorn for reason, taken in this 
sense. The Protestant theology taught that the truth 
of the Scriptures is apprehended in a penetrating, liv- 
ing way, only through “the testimony of the Holy 
Spirit,” who gave it. The Spirit that inspired the 
sacred writers must move on the heart of the reader. 


Otherwise, he stands on the outside, and will never 


get beyond an intellectual assent to the facts and pro- 
positions which they record. It may be that he will 
not even reach that. 

Pascal’s philosophy of religion turns on the distinc- 
tion between the functions of the heart and of the un- 
derstanding. The understanding by itself leads to 


_ pyrrhonism, because the understanding goes out of its 


province. If there is to be religious knowledge, God 
must not only reveal or communicate Himself, but, also, 
that in man which is related to God must be open to 
the reception of Him. This holds good of the revela- 


tion of God in the creation, as truly as of the disclosure 


of Himself in the Scriptures. There is no coercive 


revelation, no light to which the eyes cannot be closed, 
no demonstrated truth. There is a mingling of light 
and shade in the revelation which God makes of Him- 


self, to the end that the effect of it may not be irresist- 


ible. If itis true that He reveals Himself, it is also 
true that He hides Himself. He will be found of those 
who seek Him. “I wonder at the boldness with which 


90 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


‘men speak of God, in addresses to the irreligious, — 
Their first undertaking is to prove the Deity by the 


by a 


works of nature. I should not be astonished at their — 3 


undertaking, if they were addressing their discourses 


to believers ; for it is certain that all those who have 92% 


a living faith in their hear ts, see at once that there is 


nothing which is not the work of God whom they wor- | 


ship. But it is otherwise with those in whom this 


light is quenched, and in whom it is desired to revive 4 


it, persons destitute of faith and of grace, who seeking, 
with all the light they have, for everything in nature 


which can lead to this knowledge, find only obscurity 3 


and darkness: to say to these that they have only to 
look at the least thing in the world, and they will see 


God unveiled, and to give them, as the whole proof of 


this great and important subject, the course of the 
moon or of the planets, and to pretend to have com- 
pleted the proof by such a discourse,—this is only to 


furnish them occasion to think that the proofs of our | 
religion are very feeble; and I perceive, both by rea- 


son and experience, that nothing is better adapted to 


make them despise it. It is not in this way that the a : 
Scripture, which is better acquainted with the things = 
of God, speaks. On the contrary, it says that He is a 


hidden God; and that, since the corruption of nature, 
He has left men in a blindness from which they can 
only escape by Jesus Christ, without whom all com- 


= 
v ¢ 


hy 


ps PASCAL ON FAITH AND REASON. 91 


munication with God is closed: ‘No one knoweth the 
Father but. the Son, and him to whom the Son shall 
reveal Him.’ It is this which is signified by the 
Scripture when it says, in so many places, that those 
who seek God find Him. No one speaks in this way 
of a light which shines as bright as mid-day. We do 
not say that those who seek for the daylight at noon, 
or for water in the sea, will find them. And s0 it 
cannot be that such is the evidence of God in nature.’””* 
Elsewhere he says: “there is light enough for those 
who desire to see, and darkness enough for those of an 
opposite temper.” ‘God would rather make the will, 
than the mind, susceptible. Perfect clearness would 
aid the mind and be harmful to the will.” The diff- 
culties in the evidences of Christianity and theology 
are to be frankly admitted: they are a part of the 
discipline of faith. The deep meaning of an Epistle 
of Paul is opened up only in the heart of a believer. 
With him the acquaintance with it is not a mere act of 
memory. A man must, so to speak, live himself into- 
religion. He must feel his way. The consideration of ~ 
outward nature, at the best, could only make one a 
Deist. But “ the God of the Christians is a God who 
makes the soul feel that He is its only good; that all 
its rest is in Him, and that it will have no joy except 
in loving Him; and who, at the same time, makes him 


*Pensées, c. xxii. (ed. Louandre, p. 320). 


92 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


hate the obstacles which hold him back, and prevent — 
him from loving God with all his strength.”* Chris- 
tianity, Pascal teaches, accomplishes two things: it 
makes a man know that there is a God for whom men 
are susceptible, and that in their nature there is a 
corruption which makes them unworthy of Him. The 
consideration of himself and of the world should bring 
man to Christ as his Redeemer, and through Christ he 
will learn to find God everywhere and to understand 
Him. Such is the religious philosophy which satisfied 
the genius of Pascal. 
That faith includes a sense, or spiritual recognition 
of the excellence of its objects, is fundamental in the 
religious and ethical philosophy of President Edwards. 
I quote but one out of numberless passages where it 
is asserted. “If the evidence of the gospel depended 
only on history, and such reasonings as learned men ~ 
only are capable of, it would be above the reach of far 
the greatest part of mankind. But persons with but 
an ordinary degree of knowledge are capable, without 
a long and subtile train of reasoning, to see the divine 
excellency of the things of religion: they are capable 
of being taught by the Spirit of God as well as learned 
men. ‘The evidence that is this way obtained is vastly 
better and more satisfying than all that can be obtained 
by the arguings of those that are most learned, and 


* Tbid., c. xxii. 


“i ca. alla 


GERMAN THEOLOGIANS ON FAITH. 93 


greatest masters of reason. And babes are as capable 
of knowing these things as the wise and prudent; and 
they are often hid from these when they are revealed 
to those.”* 

The modern evangelical theology of Germany, as a 
reaction against Rationalism, started first from Schlei- 
ermacher, who had been preceded, to some extent, by 
Jacobi. - In very important particulars, Schleiermach- 
ers conception of religion has been modified by the 
eminent theologians who have come after, and who 
have known how to unite a genuine scientific spirit 
with evangelical belief. But in the radical idea of 
faith as having roots of its own in the moral and re- 
ligious nature, they agree with one another, and with 
the great genius to whom, however much they may 
differ from him, they consciously owe so much. This 
remark is true of such men as Twesten, Nitzsch, Ne- 
ander, Tholuck, Julius Miller, Rothe, Dorner. The 
conflict with Rationalism in Germany led to a deeper 
appreciation of the nature of religion, and to views 
more in consonance with the thoughts of Luther, and 
of profound thinkers in the Church from the begin- 
ning. 

In England, it is Coleridge, more than any other 
writer, who, by calling up the old divines, and by his 
own teaching, has done much to promote a like re- 


* Works, vol. iv. p. 449 (Sermon on Spiritual Light). 


94. FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


_generation of theology. The two characteristic points 
in Coleridge’s philosophy of religion are the distinction 
between Nature and Spirit, and the distinction be- 
tween Understanding and Reason. The doctrine of 
the free, self-determining power of the spirit, itself | 
involves an immediate recognition of a fact of con- 

sciousness, a fact swi generis; the will, in its very 
idea, presupposing an exemption from the law of cause 
and effect which extends over Nature. Coleridge’s 
idea of Reason mingles in it elements suggested by 
Kant and Jacobi. It is defined as “ the mind’s eye,” 
of which realities, not creatures of fancy, are the ob- 
jects. Itis the organ of the supersensuous, by which 
truths ave beheld which neither the senses, nor the 
understanding which deals with the materials provided — 
by sense, furnish. Faith is defined generally as “fidel- 
ity to our own being—so far as such being is not and 
can not become an object of the senses,” together with 
its.concomitants. The first recognition of conscience 
by ourselves partakes of the nature of an act. Through 
conscience, which commands and dictates, we know 
ourselves to be agents. ‘We take upon ourselves an 
allegiance, and consequently the obligation of fealty ; 
and this fealty, or fidelity, implying the power of being 
unfaithful, is the first and fundamental sense of Faith.” 
The preservation of our loyalty and fealty amid the se- 
ductions of sense and of sin constitutes the second 


we ail aay a Tae ee or Pie ee 


COLERIDGE ON FAITH. 95 


sense of Faith. And the third is what is presupposed 
in the human conscience, the acknowledgment of God, 

the rightful Superior whose will conscience reveals, 
duty to whom imparts their obligatory force to all 
other duties.* We believe in God because it is our 
duty to believe in Him. “The wonderful works of 
God in the sensible world are a perpetual discourse, 
reminding me of His existence, and shadowing out to 
me His perfections. But as all language presupposes, 
in the intelligent hearer or reader those primary 
notions which it symbolizes; as well as the power of 
making those combinations of these primary notions 
which it represents, and excites us to combine; even 
so I believe that the notion of God is essential to the 
human mind; that it is called forth into distinct con- 
sciousness principally by the conscience, and auxiliarily 
by the manifest adaptation of means to ends in the 
outward creation. It is, therefore, evident to my 
reason, that the existence of God is absolutely and 
_ necessarily insusceptible of a scientific demonstration, 
and that Scripture has so represented it. For it com- 
mands us to believe in one God. Lam the Lord thy 
God ; thou shalt have none other gods than me. Now 
all commandment necessarily relates to the will : 
whereas all scientific demonstration is independent of 
the will, and is apodictic or demonstrative only as far 


* Essay on Faith (Shedd’s ed.,) vol. v., p. 557 seq. 


é 


96 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


as it is compulsory on the mind, volentem, *nolencoa 
tem.” * With Coleridge, it is the intrinsic character oa 
of Christianity, not the external proof, which leads the — ig 
way in inspiring a conviction that God is its author. 

As “to matters of faith, to the verities of religion,” in : 3 
the belief of these “ there must always be somewhat of | 4 
moral election, ‘an act of will in it as well as of the 
understanding, as much love in it as discursive power. 
True Christian faith must have in it something of in- 
evidence, something that must be made up: by duty. 


. 9) 


and obedience.’” + The quotation included is from — 
Jeremy Taylor. In another place, Coleridge exclaims: 
“ Hvidences of Christianity ! I am weary of the word. : ~ 
Make a man feel the want of it; rouse him, if you -* 
can, to the self-knowledge of his need of it; and you. we 
may safely trust it to its own evidence; remembering 3 3 
only the express declaration of Christ Himself: ‘ No a 
man cometh to me, unless the Father leadeth him.’”{ -— 
Of the principles which underlie all specific precepts q 
of the Bible, Coleridge writes: “From the very ‘ 
nature of those principles, as taught in the Bible, they — 
are understood in exact proportion as they are believed — 
and felt. The regulator is never separated from the 4 
main-spring. For the words of the Apostle are liter- a 
ally and philosophically true: We (that is, the human — _ 
race) live by faith. Whatever we do or know that in 


* Vol. vp, 15.6 Voli. p, 328.12) Vol. i) pecess 


J. H. NEWMAN ON FAITH. 97 


kind is different from the brute creation, has its 
origin in a determination of the reason to have faith 
and trust in itself. This is the first act of faith, is 
scarcely less than identical with its own being.” * 
Among living theologians no one has set forth the 
moral basis of faith with more philosophical depth than 
Dr. John Henry Newman. Faith, a living faith, “lives 
in, and from, a desire after those things which it ac- 
cepts and confesses.” ‘‘ Philosophers, ancient and mo- 
dern, who have been eminent in physical science have 
not unfrequently shown a tendency to infidelity.” 
“Unless there be a pre-existent and independent 
interest in the inquirer’s mind, leading him to dwell 
on the phenomena which betoken an Intelligent 
Creator, he will certainly follow out those which ter- 
minate in the hypothesis of a settled order of nature 
and self-sustained laws.” “The practical safeguard 
against Atheism in the case of scientific inquirers is 


_ the inward need and desire, the inward experience of 


that Power, existing in the mind before and independ- 


ently of their examination of His material world.” 


“Faith is a process of the Reason, in which so much 
of the grounds of inference cannot be exhibited, so 
much lies in the character of the mind itself, in its ge- 
neral view of things, its estimate of the probable and 
the improbable, its impressions concerning .God’s will, 


# 


5 * Vol. i. p. 323. 


98 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


1 ed 
a ey 
’ 2 ¢ 
os cee 
ae et , ra 
‘yy pe 2 


and its anticipations derived from its own inbred — 
wishes, that it will ever seem to the world irrational 
and despicable ;—till, that is, the event confirms it,” 
“Can it, indeed, be doubted that the great majority of 
those who have sincerely and deliberately given them- — 
selves to religion, who take it for their portion, and 
stake their happiness upon it, have done So, not on an 
examination of evidence, but from a Spontaneous move- 
ment of their hearts towards it?” Faith “is said, and 
rightly, to be a venture, to involve a risk.” “We be. 
lieve because we love. How plain a truth!” “The 
safeguard of Faith is a right state of heart, This it is 
that gives it birth; it also disciplines it.” “Why does 
he’ —the believer—feel the message to be probable? 
Because he has a love for it. ..... He has a keen 
sense of the excellence of the message, of its desirable- 
ness, of its likeness to what it seems to him Divine © 
Goodness would vouchsafe, did He vouchsafe any, of 
the need of a Revelation, and its probability.” God, 
“for whatever reason, exercises us with the less evi- 
dence when He might give us the greater.” ....., 
“perchance by the defects of the evidence He is trying 
our love of its matter.” Faith “rests on the evidence 
of testimony, weak in proportion to the excellence of 
the blessing attested.”* These quotations, after what 
I have said on preceding pages, need no comment. 


eo 


nd ee ee, ee 


Sy 24 ' Sey meh 
Se ee Pa Cee, Eig ee ee 


* University Sermons, pp. 193, 194, 203, 216, 225, 234, 236. 


il; 


THE DOCTRINE OF NESCIENCE RESPECTING GOD. 


That there is a First Cause, an eternal, self-existent 
being, the source whence all things spring, is implied 
in the intuitive idea of cause. Something eternal 
must have existed; otherwise nothing could exist now. 
An infinite series of existences, each produced by the 
one before it, gives no true causal agency, and thus 
fails to satisfy the rational demand for a real cause. 
The mind is simply set off on a fruitless chase where 


there is no goal. Only an uncaused cause, or a self- 


existent, eternal being, corresponds to the rational 
demand, and gives rest to the mind. 

This is substantially conceded at the present day by 
the class known as agnostics. The question is, What 


_are the attributes of this eternal being? Is the First 


Cause intelligent and moral? Here we are met by 
the assertion that the First Cause is utterly unknowa- 
ble. It is declared to be impossible for us to make 
any assertion respecting its nature. In separ we 


100 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


are forbidden to consider the First Cause to be a person. _ 


All such representations are pronounced anthropomor- 
phic, or the offspring of the groundless fancy that the 
cause of all things is like ourselves. Mr. Herbert 
Spencer goes so far as to call the belief in the person- 
ality of God, that is, the ordinary Christian faith on 
this subject, ‘‘impious.” 

One ground of this surprising assertion is the al- 
leged inconceivability of the “Infinite.” “The infi- 
nite” is a metaphysical abstraction, and is nothing real 


whatever. What we have to inquire into is the mean- 


ing of this term as the predicate of a being or of some 


attribute of a being. Space offers the readiest example 
of an infinite, and by looking at our idea of space we 
can see the extent of our power to apprehend what is 
denoted by this term. First, it is clear that we cannot. 
picture with the imagination the infinitude of space. 
We can thus represent mentally a given portion of 
space, and we can extend this portion by addition in- 
definitely. But in this process we can come to no li- 
mit, for the obvious reason that space has no limit. 

Neither can we conceive of space as infinite, if it be 
meant that we set boundaries round the object. Space 
is one object; it is not an individual in a class; and 
thus imagination and conception with respect to it co- 
incide. 


Shall we say then that our idea of the infinite as 


\ 


- 


[THE INFINITUDE OF GOD. 101. 


predicated of space, is simply an expression of our im- 
_ potence to find a limit, to reach in our travels 
through immensity a place beyond which we cannot 
go? More than this is included in our cognition. 
Not only are we conscious of an inability in ourselves 
to.reach a limit in imagination; we know that there is 
no limit to be reached. Our assertion goes beyond a 
confession of our own weakness, and includes a positive 
affirmation respecting the object, respecting space it- 
self,—viz., that it is boundless. We have a belief pos- 
itive in its character, a conception incomplete, or 
inchoate, which is a state of mind removed, on the one 
hand, from nescience, and, on the other, from full or 
adequate comprehension. We know infinite space, but 
we know it imperfectly, obscurely. It is incompre- 
hensible, yet not a zero to our apprehension. 

In the same manner, we may know the infinitude of 
the attributes of God, of His power and His other per- 
- fections, without comprehending them. We are not 

driven to choose between the two extremes of complete 
ignorance and complete knowledge. 

Personality involves no curtailment of infinitude, as 
long as the world is absolutely dependent upon the will 
of God for its being, and when all limitation upon the 
exertion of His power is a self-limitation on His part. 

Secondly, it is objected that Christian theism falla- 

ciously assumes that the cause is like the effect, that 


102 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


God is like ourselves. “Tf for a moment,” says Spen- 
cer,—referring to Paley’s illustration of the watch— 
“we make the grotesque supposition that the tickings 


and other movements of a watch constituted a kind of — 


consciousness ; and that a watch possessed of such a 
consciousness insisted upon regarding a watchmaker’s 
actions as determined like its own by springs and es- 
capements ; we should only complete a parallel of 
which religious teachers think much.” The parallel 
fails, since religious teachers do not ascribe to God 
limbs and other physical organs, Spencer’s remark 
has no force except on the materialistic petitio prin- 
cypw that consciousness is nothing but a function of 
the bodily organs. If there were a thinking prin- 
ciple in a watch, which could adjust its move- 
ments at will, and act upon it and through it, as 
the mind of man acts upon his body, finding in-it 


arrangements adapted to his needs and purposes, then S 


this thinking principle, or mind in the watch, would. 
refer it to an intelligent maker. If the cause need not 
be like the effect, it must nevertheless be related to the 
effect ; it must be an adequate cause. This requires” 
us to assume a designer wherever there is order, or 


the adaptedness of means to ends, since prevision is | 


implied in the cause which produces it. 


There is no escape from this reasoning on the 


ground of the alleged relativity of our knowledge. — 


-* _ . 
shi as 


Sh tee Be fae 


ee Tipe 
wy ee or 
rt ets 4 


ola ich 
sj aa 


PERSONALITY OF GOD. 103 


If this phrase means that all that we know we know 
through our faculties of knowledge, none will deny it. 
If, for this reason, our knowledge is denied to be real, 
or objectively valid, this is scepticism, and must 
equally debar us from believing that there is a First 
Cause. All our knowledge, including the assumption 
of “the unknowable,” goes overboard at once. A 
like remark is to be made of the alleged growth of the 
intellectual principle, or its evolution from animal 
instinct. We are in possession of this principle, what- 
ever may be the method of its origin. Discredit it, 


and all our science vanishes into thin air. Do we 


know that there is a First Cause? If so, we know, 


also, that this cause is moral and intelligent, since the 
effects are such as imply these qualities. An inad- 
equate cause, a cause in its nature standing in no 
rational relation to its effects, is equivalent to no cause. 
The peculiarity of the effects is left unexplained. 

If we looked on the conceptions formed by us of God 
as fully coincident with reality, if we imputed to Him 
the infirmities inseparable from a finite mind, and re- 
garded our operations of thought as an exact repre- 
sentation of His, we might be charged with an offen- 
sive anthropomorphism. But this charge does not 
hold against the assumption that He is a Spirit, an 
Agent acting intelligently ; for this the effects of His 
action plainly reveal Him to be. - 


ITT. 


THE DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION IN ITS RELA- 
TION TO THE ARGUMENT OF DESIGN. 


Evolution, as a method of accounting for the origi- 


nation of living beings in Nature, and of physical 


changes, stands in contrast with the idea of separate 
acts of creation by the immediate fiat of God, or by 


His direct interference. When applied in zoology, it 


means that the different kinds of animals are geneti- 
cally connected with one another, just as individuals 
of the same species have commonly been acknowledged 
to be. It signifies that the different species arise, not 
by a special fiat calling each into being independently, 
but by transmutation, there being a genealogical rela- 
tionship between them. As regards the origin of indi- 
viduals, it is as if there were only one species, embra- 
cing the animals that are now alive, and such as have 
lived in the past. Among the scientific men who adopt 
the theory of Evolution, there are wide diversities of 
Ben as to the extent to which it is justly applicable 


A 


. 
; 
a. 
Ma 
; 
ets: 
: 

7 

; 

J 

. 
rh 


DOCTRINE OF EVOLUTION. 105 


to explain the origin of the various groups of natural 
objects. Some deem it necessary to suppose special ex- 
ertions of creative agency at particular points of tran- 
sition in the history of animal life. Many would re- 
gard the introduction of man upon the stage of being 
as constituting one of those epochs. Mr. Darwin be- 
heves that animal life, including the human species, is 
traceable to a few primitive germs, possibly to one. 
Others think that evolution provides a bridge to span 
the interval between animal and vegetable, and even 
between vegetable and inorganic existences, and as- 
sume as probable a continuous process extending back 
from the highest living being to the formless material 
of which the world was originally composed. Few, if 
any, however, would maintain that so sweeping an hy- 
pothesis can claim, in the present state of knowledge, 
any higher rank than belongs to a conjecture. That 
life is developed out of inorganic matter, or that man 
is the offspring of a lower animal, are certainly not 
as yet fully established or universally accepted truths 
of science. 

It is obvious that the doctrine of Evolution relates 
_ to the extent of the operation of second causes, or effi- 
cient causes, in the production of the world as we see 
it—the cosmos. That doctrine does not touch the 
question of the ultimate origin of the world; it does 
not necessarily touch the question whether the world, 

6* 


106 FAITH AND RATIONALISMN. 


as we behold it, is the fruit of a designing mind; nor 
does it affirm or deny the continuous co-operative 
agency of God in the processes of nature. Physical 
and natural science, as such, has nothing to do with 
religion. Its field of inquiry is second causes. In ex- : 
ploring for links of causal connection between the ob- 
jects of nature, it is engaged in its proper work. — 
Wherever it judges it impossible to find such links, it 
must say so. But science is right in never giving up 
the search so long as there is any probability of success; 
and nothing is more unreasonable than to raise an out- 
cry against a man like Mr. Darwin for broaching the __ 
hypothesis of a common descent of animals, and for ad- 
ducing the evidence which leads him to favor it. If 

there be any thing in that hypothesis to affect the doc- 

trine of theism, it must be in collateral assertions which 

are sometimes made in connection with it. It does not 
inhere in the theory itself. When a human being is 

born into the world, the proofs of a designing Creator 

are not in the least weakened by the fact that he comes 

into existence by ordinary generation, and that physio- 
logical science can explain the successive stages of his ~ 
embryonic life. What is true of the individual in re- 
lation to his kind, is equally true of one species in re- 
lation to another. We may take an illustration from 
one of the triumphs of modern inventive genius, the 
printing-press. A huge roll of blank paper is at one 


DESIGN AND SECOND CAUSES. 107 


end of a machine; at the other end there are thrown 
| out the newspapers, in large double sheets, each of the 
= right dimensions, printed on both sides, counted out in 
separate parcels, or neatly folded, in readiness for the 
mails, The whole operation of supplying the ste- 
reotype plates with a due quantity of ink, of cutting 

i the paper into separate sheets of the requisite dimen- 
sions, of printing it, first on one side and then on the 
other, and of folding each sheet in a suitable manner, 
is done by the machinery, without human interference. 


The marks of design in the machine are not dimin- 
ished, they are rather increased, by the circumstance 
that no interference is required. The machine at pre- 
i . 


f- _sent used in the New York Tribune office does not put 
R the supplement, in case one is printed, into the main 
a sheet. That work must be done, if done at all, by 
| hand. But they are now constructing a printing-press 
a which will perform this additional task also, without 
human aid. Who will say that this additional perfec- 
tion in the machine lessens the evidences of design in 
connection with the production of the newspaper? 
__. This analogy, be it observed, is not intended to ilus- 
trate the probable relation of the agency of God to 
what we call second causes—as if He stood without, and 
____ merely watched their operation. It is intended simply 
~ to show that extraordinary interpositions are not ne- 
cessary to the proof of design, and that the absence of 


yt 
ay 


108 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


such interferences raises no presumption on the side of 


atheism. It is obvious that the more complete and in- 


genious the mechanism in any invention of man, the 


less need there is of special assistance in the working 


tsi: 


Proceeding now on the supposition that nature’s 


method is that of evolution, the question is whether 
the order that we behold, the cosmos, the manifold 
examples of apparent adaptation of means to ends, 
justify the impression, which has been made on the 


generality of mankind in all ages, that the world was. 


planned, or that forethought and design have been 
exercised in the framing of it. Behind the instru- 
mentalities, the efficient causes, or acting through them, 
is there evidence of a directing intelligence? The 
alternative of design is chance. But, confining our 
attention for the moment, to the Darwinian theory, 
it is impossible to refer the animal kingdom to the 
agency of chance; quite as much so as on the old con- 
ception of the radical distinction of species> “Phe 
issue,” as Professor Gray correctly remarks, ‘ between 
the sceptic and the theist is only the old one, long ago 


argued out—namely, whether organic nature is a- 


result of design or of chance. Variation and natural 
selection open no third alternative; they concern only 


the question how the results, whether fortuitous or 


designed, may have been brought about. Organic 


DESIGN OR CHANCE? ~~ 109 


nature abounds with unmistakable and_ irresistible 


indications of design, and, being a connected and con- 


sistent system, this evidence carries the implication of 
design throughout the whole. On the other hand, 
: chance carries no probabilities with it, can never be 
developed into a consistent system, but, when applied 
to the explanation of orderly or beneficial results, heaps 
up improbabilities at every step beyond all computa- 
tion. To us, a fortuitous Cosmos is simply inconceiv- 
able. The alternative is a designed Cosmos.’* That 


4 i — the argument of design is not weakened by the Dar- 


winian doctrine is thus illustrated by the same able 


. naturalist: “All the facts about the eye, which con- 


vinced him [the sceptic] that the organ was designed, 
remain just as they were. His conviction was not 
produced through testimony or eye-witness, but design 
was irresistibly inferred from the evidence of design in 
the eye itself. Now if the eye as it is, or has become, 
so convincingly argued design, why not each particular 


- step or part of this result? If the production of a per- 


fect crystalline lens in the eye—you know not how— 
as much indicated design as did the production of a 


Be ~ Dollond achromatic lens—you understand how—then 


_ why does not ‘ the swelling out’ of a particular portion 
of the membrane behind the iris—caused you know 
not how—which, by ‘correcting the errors of disper- 


* Darwiniana, p. 158. <n 


110 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


sion and making the image somewhat more colorless,’ 
enabled the young ‘animals to see more distinctly than 
their parents or brethren,’ equally indicate design—if 
not as much as a perfect crystalline, or a Dollond com- 
pound lens, yet as much as a common spectacle glass ? 
Darwin only assures you that what you may have 
thought was done directly and at once was done in- 
directly and successively. But you freely admit that 
indirection and succession do not invalidate design, 
and also that Paley and all the natural theologians 
drew the arguments which convinced your sceptic 
wholly from eyes indirectly or naturally produced. 
Recall a woman of a past generation and show her a 
web of cloth; ask her how it was made, and she will 
say that the wool or cotton was carded, spun, and 
woven by hand. When you tell her it was not made 
by manual labor, that probably no hand has touched 
the materials throughout the process, it is possible that 
she might at first regard your statement as tantamount 
to the assertion that the cloth was made without 
design. If she did, she would not credit your state- 
ment. If you patiently explained to her the theory of 
carding-machines, spinning-jennies, and power-looms, 
would her reception of your explanation weaken her 
conviction that the cloth was the result of desion? It 
is certain that she would believe in design as firmly as 
before, and that this belief would be attended by a 


* 


NATURAL SELECTION. 111 


\ 


higher conception and reverent admiration of a wis- 
dom, skill, and power greatly beyond anything she 
had previously conceived possible.”* 
The three agencies which are mainly instrumental, 
according to the doctrine of evolution, in producing 
P the animal kingdom as it now exists, are the law of 
3 heredity, or the tendency of a living being to produce 
offspring like itself, the law of variation, or a coexisting 
tendency to produce offspring with slight differences 
from the parent and from one another, and natural se- 
p. lection, which prevents over-population and effects the 
‘ survival of the fittest. Other tendencies in nature are 
E auxiliary to these, such as the desire of food, and the 
a disposition to struggle for it against rivals. It is 
through the co-working of these instrumentalities that 
__ the system of nature is educed. But neither of them, 
= nor all of them together, avail to account for the order 
_ of nature that results, and this for the reason that they 
are blind, unintelligent forces. Let the intermediate 
process be what it may, let the paths to the goal be 
3 X never so devious, the goal is reached, and the outcome is 

of such a nature as to make it evident that it was aimed 
at from the start. “Natural selection is not an agent, 
but a result; and it is, moreover, only a negative or 
= - privative result.” The favored party in the struggle — 
“does not owe his existence, but only his sole existence 


* Ibid. pp. 84, 85. 


112 _FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


to it, as distinguished from the fate of a rival who 
perishes.” ‘“ Natural selection only weeds, and does 
not plant ; it is the drain of Nature, carrying off the 
irregularities, the monstrosities, the abortions; it 
comes in after and upon the active developments of 
Nature to prune and thin them; but it does not create _* 
a species ; it does not possess one productive or gener- — 
ative function.” Canon Mozley, from whom these 
extracts are taken, proceeds to show how untenable is 
the idea of a variability left utterly to chance: “If 
natural selection, then, has nothing to do with the — 
production of favorable variations, but only adopts them 
when they arise ; in the absence of any law to dictate ; 
or direct in any way the course of such variations, © ss 
nothing of which kind is as yet supplied to us; whence — x 
does Mr. Darwin get that succession of favorable 
variations which is necessary for the ultimate forma- 
tion of a regular and highly organized species? How 
shall this long succession of slight advances in the a. 
same line, which are requisite to develop an organor 
limit, be obtained?” More than this, a continuous - 
development in several organs, and several limbs, all a 
expanding in harmony, and growing into a composite — Ee, 
and complete animal whole, has to be accounted for. 
“We do not see how chance, however long a time it } 
had to work in, could possibly account for this succes- 
sion of steps in Nature, all fitting in with preceding 


VARIATION UNDER GUIDANCE. 113 


steps; this train of developments of, and additions to, 
a rudimental organic stock, all respectively joining on 
to the last one, and at length collectively forming a 
harmonious whole. ~ Undoubtedly chance variation will 
give you in an infinity of time certain given variations, 
but im what character do these variations come?” 
“ They come, but they do not stay: they are off again, 
and others come in their place ;—for we must keep 
faithfully to the hypothesis of a real infinite chance 
variation as a law of nature. If amid this crowd of 
changing forms of life, in this ocean of fluctuation and 
metamorphosis, some structural points stand perma- 
nently out as insulations in the scene; if these have a 
correspondence with each other, and form an harmoni- 
ous animal fabric ; if these arrivals, we say, which are 
fixed, also cohere and agree ;—this is not included 
within the hypothesis, and must be accounted for in 
some other way. The chances then that you get by 
the mere infinity of variation do not construct a 
species. You only regard your infinite variability on 
one side, viz., as furnishing your required chance; you 
do not regard it, on the other, as taking it away when 
it has given it; you do not see that what is gained by 
chance is also lost by chance.” “A negotiation and 
compact with this wild power ”’—chance—“ is impossi- 
ble. Is not the advocate of natural selection deceived 
by the enormous intervals of time which he interposes 


C14 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


between the successive steps of the progress, so that he 
forgets every time the succeeding step comes, that it is 
a coincidence with a preceding one? These successive — 
coinciding developments equally require to be account- 
ed for, whether the intervals between them are min- 
utes or ages. Suppose I throw in regular series from 
one to fifty, the chances against those fifty throws in 
succession are the same, whether there. is a second of © 
time between each two or a million of years. But the 
advocate of natural selection seems to think that, be- 
cause he throws with ages between instead of seconds, 
the coincidence in his successive throws has not to be 
accounted for.” The Epicurean theory appealed to 


the infinite duration of the world as the ground of the an 


possibility of ascribing it to chance. ‘Such a position 
is of course absurd, because no time can really exhaust 
chance. Chance is as infinite as time. Chance, there- 
fore, could never bring the Epicurean his basis of uni- 
versal order in any extent of time. Nor could a 
simple, undirected variability without scope or aim, 
ever produce the existing world of species; it could 
never exhaust its stock of incongruities and imperfec- 
tions.’”* 

It is obvious that variability is under restraint. 
In agreement with the tenor of the foregoing remarks 
by an eminent metaphysician, are the statements 


* Mozley’s Essays, Vol. II., pp. 387, 396, 399, 402, 406. 


VARIATION UNDER GUIDANCE. 115 


which follow from an equally eminent naturalist, who 


favors the Darwinian view. He points out two 


sources of confusion in the discussion. “One is the 
notion of the direct and independent creation of spe- 
cies, with only an ideal connection between them, 
to question which was thought to question the princi- 
ple of design. The other is a wrong idea of the nature 
and province of natural selection.” “ Natural selec- 
tion is not the wind that propels the vessel, but the 
rudder, which, by friction, now on this side and now 


‘on that, shapes the course. The rudder acts while the 


vessel is in motion, effects nothing while it is at rest. 
Variation answers to the wind: ‘Thou hearest the 
sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh or 
whither it goeth.’ Its course is controlled by natural 
selection, the action of which, at any given moment, is 
seemingly small or insensible; but the ultimate results 
are great. This proceeds mainly through outward 


- influences. But we are more and more convinced that 


variation, and, therefore, the ground of adaptation, is 
not a product of, but a response to, the action of the 
environment. Variations, in other words, the differ- 
ences between individual plants and animals, are evi- 
dently not from without, but from within—not physi- 
cal, but physiological.” In the case of plants, “the 
occult power, whatever it be, does not seem in any 
given case to act vaguely, producing all sorts of varia- 


116 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


tions from a common centre, to be reduced by the 
struggle for life to fewness and the appearance of 
order; these are, rather, orderly indications from the 
first.”* “So long as gradatory, orderly, and adapted 
forms in nature argue design, and at least while the - 
physical cause of variation is utterly unknown and 
mysterious, we should advise Mr. Darwin to assume, 
in the philosophy of his hypothesis, that variation has 
been led along certain beneficial lines.”’t “I argue 
that, judging from the past, it is not improbable that 
variation itself may be hereafter shown to result from 
physical causes. . . . . . But the whole course 
of scientific discovery goes to assure us that the disco- 
very of the cause of variation will be only a resolution 
of variation into two factors—one, the immediate, 
secondary cause of the change which so far explains 
them; the other, an unresolved or unexplained phe- 
nomenon, which will then stand just where the pro- 
duct, variation, now stands, only that it will be one 
step nearer to the efficient cause.” t Reasoning and 
the facts of science concur in leading us to the conclu- 
sion that variability is not a wild, unregulated ten- 
dency, but is under guidance, and is the agent of 
design. 

It has sometimes been objected to the argument of 
design that we cannot reason from the works of man 


* Darwiniana, pp. 386, 387. ft Ibid., p. 148. f°P. 76. 


NATURE AND ART. LZ 


to the products of Nature. The former are made, the 
latter grow. That is, the mode of their origination is 
different. It is said that if we found a watch, even if 
we had never seen one before, we should recognize it 
as the result of human workmanship, from the previ- 
ous observation of the sort of things that are made by 
man. Neither of these objections is valid. Neither is 
relevant. That in the watch which convinces us im- 
mediately that it was designed, is the mechanism, and 
the adaptedness of it to mark time. What if, on 
other grounds also, we might infer that it was made? 
This does not affect the validity of the conclusion as 
inferred from the marks of design observed in it, from 
its fitness to subserve an end. When we observe the 
mechanism of the human body, with its various or- 
gans in their relation to one another, we infer, with a 
like certainty, that it was designed, although we have 
never seen the Author, and although we are obliged to 
attribute to Him superhuman power. 

The most frequent objection of late to the argu- 
ment of design may be put in the form of the 
proposition that things were not made for their 
use, but are used because they are made. Their 
use simply ensues upon their existence. This 
objection merely ignores the point of the argument 
which it opposes, as is shown by Canon Mozley in the 


~ following passage : 


Tae PT eh Dade ee ae ee 
rn 2 La A, pas ee Sa ) 


i* ee bs ] 


118 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


“We never saw any argumentative formulas of 
Encyclopeedists against design in Nature, which did 
not substantially amount to this, viz., to saying, Shut 
your eyes to design, and you will not see it. The 
philosophy involved in this dictum is exactly the same. 
as that which we have in theirs, and it has the advan- 
tage of being more plainly expressed. Take their car- 
dinal formula—‘ Conditions of Existence’*—that the 
structure of the body is not intended for life, but that 
life follows from it, and would not exist without it, i.e., 
that the bodily structure is the condition of existence, 
and no more. The ingenuity and plausibility, then, of 
this formula is wholly obtained by an omission, and by > 
the audacity with which that omission is made; by the 
circumstance that it fastens the mind upon sequence, 
and thrusts aside and ignores the natural, the unavoid- 
able aspect of provision. In every system or compages 
of forces which issues in some particular result, any 
one of the forces of which the whole is composed, is the 
condition of the production of that result. In chemical 
combination each separate item is the condition of the 
whole. One pipe or one artery within the body, one. 


* “ Les causes finales ne sont, en dépit de leur nom, que les effets 
évidens, ou les conditions memes de Vexistence de chaque objet.”— 
Revue Encuclopedique, vol. v., p. 231. “Cuvier seems to have 
adopted the term in a sense not opposed to final causes.”—Owen’s 
Comparative Anatomy, vol. iii., p. 787. 


“QONDITIONS OF EXISTENCE.” 119 


single ingredient in the air outside of it, is the condi- 
tion of existence. But it is evident that an apparatus, 
as one harmonious whole, stands in a different relation 
toward the result which it produces, from that of one 
or other single item of it; and that the relation of sine 
qua non, though included in, is not the complete and 
adequate expression of that aspect of the machinery as 
a whole. That whole is naturally regarded by the 
mind not only in this light, viz., that something follows 
from it, but also in another light, viz., that it is con- 
structed for something. We see a concurrent action 
towards, as well as a sequence from; we see more than 
conditions of existence,—we see a provision for exist-— 
ence. The end does not simply come after the means, 
but the means intend the end. But the formula—‘ Con- 
ditions of Existence ’—will not recognize a consequence ; 
only see the retrospective view, not the prospective. 
It only sees in sentient life the upshot of the bodily 
combinations, and discards the aspect of it as the end 
and scope of them. ‘The formula, therefore, attains its 
purpose by omission. Look only at a sequence, and 
you will only see a sequence. Geoffrey St. Hilaire, 
who carried the art of shutting the eyes toa high point 
of philosophical perfection, applied a scientific culture 
to this act of the mind. The point of view which he 
constructed for the purpose of exactly cutting off the 
approach of the proposition of common sense, reminds 


10 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


one of some skilful piece of military engineering, which — 
projects the angle of a bastion in the direction which 
cuts off the assault from one threatening quarter in the 
country around; and is a curious specimen of the 
dogged perversity of a man of genius when he does not 
like one direction in which things are going, and 
opposes to obtrusive evidence the science of not seeing. 
‘Voir les fonctions d’abord, puis aprés les instrumens 
qui les produisent, c’est renverser l’orde des idées, 
Pour un naturaliste qui conclut d’apres leg faits, chaque 
étre est sorti des mains du Oréateur, avec de propres 
conditions matérielles: il peut, selon qu'il lui est attribué 
de pouvoir: il emploie ses organes selon leur capacité 
d'action.” * It is a misstatement, then, to say that the 

advocates of design look at functions first, and at 


* Prineipes de Philosophie Zoologique, p. 66. His illustration 
against design is: “A raisonner de la sorte, vous diriez d’un homme 
qui fait usage de béquilles, qu’il était ori ginairement destiné au mal- 
heur d’avoir lune de ses jambes paralysée ou amputée.” It is, 
however, a most gratuitous transposition of the final cause to fit the 
man to the crutch, instead of what is much more obvious,—the 
crutch to the man. We cannot but add, with reference to the defect 
of logical training which these great scientific investigators some- 
times show, that it is singular that Cuvier and St. Hilaire should 
dispute over two hundred pages upon the identity of organs, e. g., 
whether the fore-hoof of an ox is exactly the ‘same otgan” with the 
wing of a bat, without it occurring to either of them to ask, whether 
they were using “identity ” in the same sense or using it in different 
senses and different respects, 3 eee hs 


~ 
, - 


- “CONDITIONS OF EXISTENCE.” 121 


instruments for the functions afterwards; what they do 
is to look at both together, and argue from their con- 
currence. But this, looking at them both, and looking 
at them in concurrence, is what St. Hilaire prohibits ; 
it is not our seeing one before the other, but seeing the 
two in relation, which constitutes our offence. He will 
not allow the instrument to be looked at as agreeing 
with the work, but only at the work as necessarily 
coming out of the instrument. That is his point of 
view. Looking at the case, then, in this accurately 
limited point of view, design is undoubtedly excluded. 
Granted the construction of the instrument, the em- 
ployment of it, or the function, does not flow from the 
construction by design, but by necessity. The instru- 
ment works, and works according to its make, and 
according to its component parts. How can it work 
otherwise? The function is the only action of which 
the instrument is capable, and therefore is an unavoid- 
able derivation for the instrument. But though, this 
point of view granted, design is excluded, what right 
has St. Hilaire to impose this point of view? On what 
ground does he assert that the instrument works 
according to its construction, and that that 1s all? 
We say there is something besides the instrument 
working according to its construction, viz, that the 
instrument is constructed for its work; we assert this 
on the ground of the plain agreement and coincidence 


t 


122 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


of the two. St. Hilaire says you have no right to see 


coincidence and correspondence; you have only the 
right to see the work proceeding from the instrument; 
you have no right to see the adaptation of the instru- 
ment for the work; you are at liberty to perceive the 


motion derived from the oars and sails; you are forbid- 


den to discern the aptitudes of the oars and sails to pro- 
duce the motion of the boat. But if there are two rela- 
tions to be seen, why should we only see one of them ?” 

All criticism of the methods of Nature, all accusa- 
tions of a want of simplicity, or a want of benevo- 


lence, in its arrangements, have no force as arguments 


against the existence of an intelligent Creator. What- - 


ever weight may be supposed to belong to such objec- 
tions, pertains to them as bearing on the conception 
that is to be formed of the attributes of God. From this 
point of view, they are generally specimens of reason- 
ing upon a vast system, of which material things form 
only a part, and which is imperfectly comprehended. . 
The force of the argument of design depends on the 
assumption that man has a ‘soul, that he is a spirit, 
personal and free. Materialists deny this. By others, 
it is left doubtful. Professor Huxley, in his Essay on 
Protoplasm, says: “What do we know of that-‘ ‘spirit’ 
over whose threatened extinction so great a lamentation 
is arising . . . . except that”—like matter— 
“ it is also the name for an unknown and hypothetical 


MATTER AND SPIRIT. 7 es ies: 


cause, or condition of states of consciousness ?” 
“Matter and spirit are but names for the imaginary 
substrata of the groups of natural phenomena.” That 
is to say, self, the ego, is a “hypothetical,” “imaginary” 
substratum of mental states. Here our knowledge 
of matter and mind are put on a level. But of our- 
selves we have undeniably a direct, immediate intui- 
tion. It is far less unreasonable for one to be a Ber- 
keleian, or even an idealist, than to question the reality 
of himself as a substance, or personal subject. But, 
following Hume, Professor Huxley calls in question the 
fact of the intuition of self. Kant reached the same 
conclusion on other grounds. But the cogito, ergo sum 
of Des Cartes stands firm; not as a logical inference, 
but as giving the condition of the intuitive idea, which 
is the unassailable guaranty of the reality of the object 
—the ego. As the personal subject is grammatically 
involved in the cogito,so in the act of thought is 
the reality of the thinker implied. If he knows that 
he thinks, he knows that he exists. The existence of 
the ego is as evident in consciousness as is the existence 
of the thought. The thought is, and is known to be, 
the act or state of the ego. The idea of mental 


“phenomena” without mind, is as absurd as the idea 


of luminosity without a thing that is luminous. I 


know myself, as an entity, maintaining persistently its 
identity; and I know myself as distinct from my 


124 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. - 


organism, from my heart, and lungs, and liver, and 
brain, and the whole material system with which I am 


connected.* It is granted that the “phenomena” are _ 


known to be toto genere distinct from those of the body 
and of matter; desire, memory, love, hate, are abso- 


lutely dissimilar to nerves and blood-vessels. The 


substance of which these thoughts and feelings are the 
manifestation 1s equally distinct. Dr. Tyndall has well 
said: “Granted that a definite thought and a definite 
molecular action in the brain occur simultaneously, we 
do not possess the intellectual organ, nor, apparently, 
any rudiment of the organ, which would enable us to 
pass by a process of reasoning from one phenomenon 
to the other. They appear together, but we do not 
know why.” “The passage from the physics of the 


brain to the corresponding facts of consciousness is — 


unthinkable.” “ The problem of the connection of the 
body and soul is as insoluble, as it was in the pre- 
scientific ages.”+ To say that the soul is the body, or 
a portion of the body, or a mere function of the body, 
is, therefore, not only to make an -assertion of which 
science can offer no proof; but it is to make an asser- 


tion which consciousness repudiates as inconsistent — 


with the intuition of self. 


* Compare Mozley, Vol. IL., p. 368. 


+ From the Address on the Methods and Tendencies of Physical 
Investigation, 


t J ‘, 
Ay = pis 5 f are mi, i 
= pee ee NS gs ee ee ene 


SOS Se et Ce Pee eee Pe Lee ae ee ee 


aM re 


Behe whee 


THE INTUITION OF SELF. 125 


This recognition of our own personality is essential 


_ to the due validity and impressiveness of the argument 


of design, in two ways. It is the consciousness of my- 
self as a free intelligence, adapting means to ends, that 
raises in me the image of a higher Intelligence to whom 
Iam like. Without this idea and norm within me, I 
should neither have any conception of God as a Crea- 
tor, nor any proof of His existence. Secondly, in man 
there is presented a worthy end, towards which physi- 
cal arrangements point; and thus completeness is given 
to the argument of design. This last point is forci- 
bly presented by the author from whom I have already 
cited. Nothing but “the spiritual principle can give 
that strong, pointed and masterly end of the physical 
apparatus, which our reason wants in order to crown 
that apparatus with design.” “It is only when we 
come to man that an end in immediate connection with 
an animal machinery shines forth with such overpower- 
ing intrinsic evidence, and stands out in so conspicuous 
and irresistible a light, that the completing stroke and 


_ finish is given to the evidence of design. In man the 


end is so distinctly superior to the machine, the end is 
so clearly beyond the machine, that the argument 
strikes home.” ‘Can any thing exceed the conviction 
with which any man, when he really thinks of himself, 
and thinks of his body, must say, This body exists for 
the sake of me: I am its end, all this machinery is no- 


“a \ 


126 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


thing without myself as an explanation? A man can- 
not rid himself of this sense of the object of his own 
body, that it is for the sake of him—that personal self ; 
of which he is conscious: the purpose clings to the ma- 
chine, and cannot be parted from it. And, therefore, 
inasmuch as he is a different thing from the machine, 
he sees distinctly that this machine exists for an end 
beyond itself, which is the coping-stone of the argu- 
ment of design.” “Does not the great argument of 
Paley derive its real pungency from the reader having 
always, consciously or unconsciously, man in his mind — 
in connection with the machinery of Nature? In the 
description of the eye, he thinks of man, of himself, 
who sees.” * 

The atheism that rests in second causes, that traces 
the world back to a collection of atoms, and there 
halts, could not be more pointedly condemned than 
in the words of the founder of the inductive phi- 
losophy, who knew how to use without abusing the 
truth of final causes. “It is true,” says Lord Bacon, 
“that a little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to athe- 
ism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men’s minds 
about to religion. For while the mind of man looketh 
upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in 
them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the 
chain of them, confederate and linked together, it must 


* Mozley’s Essays, Vol. IL, p. 366 seq. 


Ke 


ay BACON ON A PHBISM. 


is ie Avie to ahha tnd Dee Nay that school _ ; 
Bye which is most accused of atheism doth most demon- 


4 i strate religion; that is, the school of Leucippus and IG 
5: De emocritus and Hpicurus. For itis athousand times  __ so 
om more credible that four mutable elements, and one im- _ os. 
) iuitable fifth essence, duly and eternally placed, need a! 
. no God, than that an army of infinite small portions | ns 

“or seeds, unplaced, should have produced this order ee 


and beauty without a divine marshal.’* ee. eg 


*esayss xvi., of Atheism, 


IV. 


THE REASONABLENESS OF THE CHRISTIAN 
DOCTRINE OF PRAYER. 


Prayer, in its fundamental idea, is petition. It is so 
described in the teaching of Christ (Matt. vii. 7 seq., 
Luke xi. 5 seq., xvii. 1 seq.). A child goes toa father 
with a request for something. It is a perfectly natural 
and reasonable act where there is dependence and want 
on one side, and strength and the spirit of helpfulness 
on the other. Nothing is more common than for men 
to answer the prayers addressed to them. Sometimes 
they will do this where there is no stronger motive 
_than a desire to get rid of the suppliant. To represent 
- God as moved by prayer to grant what He is asked to 
give, does not imply that He is mutable in character, 
but it implies the opposite. For the prayer is a new 


fact. The sincere, filial uplooking to Him, which is 


the root and essence of supplication, finds a fit response 

in the bestowal of the good that is sought. If God 

were eee in all respects, with the prayerful, as He 
28 


PRAYER. 129 


deals with the prayerless, it would be treating the 
humble and the self-sufficient, the good and the 
~ evil, in all respects alike. This would not be un- 
changeable goodness and justice, but would indicate 


4 the absence of these qualities. 
| Petition is always to be broadly distinguished from 
demand or dictation. It may be granted or not, at 
Bm ~- the option of the person addressed. In a family, there 
are some requests which are certain to be complied 
with. “What man is there of you if his son ask 
a _ bread, will he give him a stone?” If a child asks for 
moral direction, for light respecting matters of great 
q - concern to him, or if he appeals for support in tempta- 
tion or sorrow, no one with the heart of a father would 
ever withhold the good sought. So in the Bible, the 
promise of the Spirit of God is made, without qualifica- 
~tion, to every one who petitions for this best gift for 
himself (Luke xi. 13). As to a great variety of things 
which children may ask of a parent, while the simple 
fact of an innocent request produces an inclination to 
comply with it, and thus tends to procure the good 
sought, it is yet, of course, left to the discretion of the 
parent to give or to withhold it. So of petitions to the 
Heavenly Father. It may be for the real interest, if 
not for the immediate gratification, of the petitioner to 
have them denied. It rests with the perfect wisdom 


and love of God to determine: ‘ Nevertheless, not my 
6* 


130 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


will, but thine be done.” No one can say with cer- 
tainty that it would be better for him to be rich than 
to be poor, to escape from bereavement rather than to 
suffer it, to have honor than to have reproach, to live 
on to old age than to die young, etc. These are ques- 
tions of probability, where human judgment may be 
quite astray, and human preference may be unwise. 
It requires omniscience to decide them infallibly. This 
is true of a thousand things which may be suitable 
objects of prayer. 

There is a limit, however, to the proper objects of 
petition. A father has a given system, certain known 
principles, for the management of his household. It 
would be wrong, as well as futile, to ask him to do 
something which clashes with the wise and well-under- 
stood method under which the affairs of the family are 
conducted. A child who, perhaps, might properly ask 
his father to change the hour of dinner, either perma- 
nently, or on a particular day, might be guilty of dis- 
respect if he were to request that all the meals of the 
family should take place in the night-time. To ask for 
a new article of furniture is one thing; to ask that the 
house may be burned down is another. When the 
head of a household has acquainted his family with the 
arrangements, from which he chooses not to deviate, — 
an enclosure is made within which, in all ordinary cir- 
cumstances, petitions are out of place. 


~ 


MEANS OF ANSWERING PRAYER. iio Al 


Applying the analogy to God in His relation to men, 
we find certain fixed arrangements in the constitution 
of man and of the world, and we meet, in the course of 
- events, with certain plain and decisive indications of 
what the will of God is for the future. No reverent or 
reasonable man would pray that the sun might rise at 
midnight, that an apple-tree might bear fruit out of 
_ doors in mid-winter, that a young child might have at 
once the mental power and knowledge of a man, or 
that certain invalids, in the last stages of mortal dis- 
ease, might recover. There is virtually a declared 
_ purpose of God to the contrary, as evident as if it were 
expressed in words, upon the matter of these petitions. 
_ They manifestly call for such a revolution in God’s 
mode of governing the world as we have no right to 
look for, under the ordinary circumstances of human 

life. 


— But it does not follow, because there is an appointed 


order of things, that there is no space left for the 


hearing and answering of prayer. There are channels 
| open between God and the human soul. God is a 
Person, and He does not withdraw Himself from con- 
verse with His children. The divine Spirit can impart 
light, guidance, courage, strength to resist temptation, 
comfort in despondency, to the spirit of man. And 
outward changes, within the sphere of material nature, 
are largely dependent on human perceptions, feclings, 


Bay ee FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


and volitions. Indirectly, thus, changes in the material 
sphere may be effected by a divine influence on the 
mind of man. The physician, the nurse, the sea-cap- 
tain, the general, every human being who has the lives 
and temporal interests of his fellow-men under his 
charge, may be guided, enlightened, practically con- 
trolled, by a divine influence exerted upon the mind in 
response to supplication. Although there are laws of 
mind as well as of matter, the reasonableness of prayer 
for changes of the character just stated is compara- 
tively seldom questioned. It is in respect to prayer 
for purely physical changes, where material forces are 
exclusively concerned, that the difficulty is chiefly felt. 
It is sometimes said that to grant such prayers would 
argue an inconsistency, or fickleness in God, who has 
already established the course of Nature. It is, also, 
urged that the course of Nature being fixed and uni- 
form, no means are open for rendering answers to sup- 
plications of this sort. 

Before taking up this topic, it is well to notice a 
preliminary objection which is sometimes raised on this 


subject. It is said that an exact boundary cannot be 


fixed between the provinces of Nature, where prayer, — 


by common consent, is shut out—as the astronomic 
system—and the sphere within which prayer is consid- 
ered to have an influence. But here the analogy of 
sthe family comes in, where the line of demarcation 


33 

* 
zy 
3 

* 
a 

j 
48 
co 


( me 
Pr. eee ye 


EY 


ee 


Z U A 
) wa | a) Be ‘ 
ee te a 


= 
~ 


PRAYER FOR PHYSICAL CHANGES. Nips ts: 


beyond which petitions to the parent are precluded by 
unalterable arrangements may not always be correctly 
defined by the children. The possibility of mistake in 
this regard does not do away with the admitted fact 
that there is a real distinction of the kind, and one 
which is practically acted on. The circumstance that 
there may be extravagant petitions does not prove that 
there are none which are reasonable. Our belief in 
the supernatural, and the expéctations dictated by it, 
are modified by education. They are not extirpated, 
but pruned and directed; in this respect resembling 
the other faculties and tendencies of our nature. It is 
so with regard to the belief in miracles. Once they 
may have been expected on many occasions where now 
they are not looked for. On this ground it would be 
a rash and false conclusion that they are impossible, or 
that, under given circumstances—as parts and proofs 
of a Revelation—they are unlikely to occur. 

The question whether prayer for physical changes is 
answered is to be considered from the stand-point of 
theism. On the pantheistic or atheistic assumption, 
or on the plane of materialism, there is no room for 
such adiscussion. If there is no God to answer prayer, 
of course prayer will not be answered. An Epicu- 
rean deity who stands aloof from the world, and is 
indifferent to the wants of men, is equivalent, as 
regards the present inquiry, to no God at all. We 


134 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


assume, on evidence which need not be recapitulated 
here, that God is a Person, who is capable of entering 
into communion with men, and of hearing their peti- 
tions, and that He is merciful. But there are laws of 


Nature, and the question is whether they constitute, . 


for any reason, a barrier in the way of His responding 
to these petitions. It is altogether a mistake, we may 
add, to suppose that the existence of natural laws and 


a natural order is a modern discovery. ‘The idea of 


‘the tree yielding fruit after his kind whose seed is in 


itself” is in the beginning of Genesis; the uniform 
movement of the tides and of the heavenly bodies, and 
the regular processes of animal life, are the subject of 
sublime passages in Job; the constant procession of 
Nature in seed-time and harvest, in day and night, is 
recognized throughout the Scriptures. The ascription 
of natural phenomena to God’s agency, and belief in 
supernatural interpositions, did not exclude a belief, 
likewise, in natural laws. In fact, this belief- was 
implied in the idea of a miracle. But, to return to 
the point, what to a theist is natural law? Law 
is not a being; it is an abstraction. It is a term 
for expressing the uniformity of the sequences 
of Nature. Law is another name for invariable 
succession. ire, brought into contact with a 
certain class of material things, burns; not once, 
or twice, but always. The conditions being the 


oe ile i dS tial, 
; } 


™~ 


OQ as nk ae yes aD 
an ad on 


== 


Pome 


Sr MR IS GER PRP EEE Ne SEC ee Ree MeN Eee of 
~ ~, é . - We i ote ‘s 


THE ORDER OF NATURE. 135 


same, the same effect follows. This, we say, is a law. 
But theism holds not only that law is no agent, but 
that agency, so far as it belongs to objects in Nature, 
is dependent upon, and either immediately or ultimate- 
ly derived from, the Creator and Preserver of Nature. 
Law signifies His plan of acting, or the plan which the 
living God ordains for the action of the forces of 
matter. That there is an order of Nature, the theist 
fully recognizes. Indeed, from this order—as far as 
the evidence from Nature is concerned—he derives his 
proof that God is an intelligent being. The wisdom of 
instituting such an order, on which all our anticipa- 
tions of the future rest, is too obvious to be denied by 
anybody. The theist holds, however, that Nature has 
not its end in itself, is not for its own sake. The 


whole end of the visible creation it-is beyond our pow- 


er to ascertain ; but one end is the well-being of man. 


To man the lower orders of being point. No sanctity 
belongs to the laws of external Nature, as such. They 
are a method adapted for an end beyond themselves. 
They are a part of a more extensive order, which em- 
braces moral and spiritual being, and can only be 
imperfectly comprehended. If any of the foregoing 
propositions are disputed, the controversy lies back of 
the question now before us. It pertains to the grounds 
of theism. 

Now to assert that God cannot answer prayer for 


136 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


physical changes—cannot, if He will—is to assert what 
it is impossible to prove. He who remembers our very 
limited knowledge of Nature,—how much we have to 
learn, notwithstanding the remarkable progress of na- 
tural science in recent days; who is sensible, too, that 
we are in the dark as to the modus operandi of God in 
His relation to Nature, will be slow to limit thus the 
resources of omnipotence. 

But there are ways in which we can conceive that 
prayers for physical changes may be answered. I dis- 
miss, at the outset, the idea that the benefit of prayer 
is purely reflex, as if it were a spiritual’ gymnastic 
having its whole effect on the mind of the suppliant. 
No one can offer a real prayer on such a theory; for 
the subjective benefit from it, whatever that may be, is 
conditioned on the belief in its objective efficacy. 
Schieiermacher’s idea that prayer answers itself by ope. 
rating, as a cause among causes, producing its own ful- 
filment, and a similar suggestion of Chalmers—which, 
however, is not given as his own opinion—that there — 
may be conceivably a subtle tie of connection between 
the prayer and its answer, in the domain of second 
causes, are liable to the same objection. Under such a 
view, prayer ceases to be a bona fide petition. More- 
over, no room, apparently, is left for the exercise of 
discretion as to granting or denying it. 

There are two ways, at least, in which it may be 


‘PRAYER FOR PHYSICAL CHANGES. Ty. 


conceived that prayers for physical changes are com- 
pled with. 
The first assumes a pre-arranged harmony between 
the prayer and the answer provided for it. Both had 
their place—the one as a free act of man, the other as 
a physical change ordained to correspond to it—in the 
plan of the world. ‘The train of causes is set at the be- 
ginning, in the foreknowledge of the petition to be of- 
fered, for the evolving of an appropriate response. No 
interposition is required. The reign of law is undis- 
turbed.* Itis felt by many to be an objection to this 
view that if nothing is to occur except what causes al- 
ready in operation virtually contain, it scems like 
praying about what is past and beyond recall. 

The second view is that, in answering prayer, God 
“may interpose, not manifestly as in the case of a 
miracle, but, by the control which He exercises over the 
laws of Nature, may modify the effect of their action. 
That such power belongs to God no one who believes 
in Him will think of questioning. A like power, in a 
less degree, belongs to men. It is exerted every time 
one raises his arm by an act of will. It is exerted 
whenever a man pumps water out of a well. The 
~ initial force is in his volition; the effect is a phenome- 
non that would not have occurred, independently of 


that new, and—as regards material nature—supernatu- 


~* See McCosh’s Method of the Divine Government, p. 0 


138 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ral antecedent. Yet it is through the instrumentality | 
of Nature and of its laws that the human will pro- 
duces these new effects. All that is included under 
the term Art, all the works and contrivances of man- 
kind, spring from such interpositions of the human- 
will, which produce through the medium of natural 
forces new products. The botanist and the cattle- 
breeder exert an almost creative power, not by coun- 
teracting the laws of nature, but by using and 
directing them. If, it has been well said, Professor 
Espy can cause a shower of rain, God can. If, nature~ 
is thus plastic in the hands of the creature, how much 
more in the hands of the Creator! What we call the 
course of Nature is the will of God acting systemati- 
cally, either as the sole efficient, or through the inter- 
mediary agency of second causes. On either hypo- 
thesis it is easy to suppose a new influx of energy from 
the primal source of power, or a new combination in 
the occult laboratory of Nature, which shall modify, in 
a corresponding degree, visible phenomena. 
Such an act of God need produce no variation in 
the sequences of phenomena so far as they are cogni- 
zable by man. The modification of causes may take 
place back of all proximate forces, in a region which 
science cannot penetrate; for science does not pretend 
to follow phenomena back to their ultimate antece- 
dents. There is a curtain which is soon reached, 


THE UNIFORMITY OF NATURE. 139 


through which human observation cannot pierce. The 
intervention of Deity is out of sight, among the 
remoter forces that are nearer the primitive fountain 
of power in Himself Chalmers illustrates this view 
_ by showing how a prayer for a prosperous voyage may 
be answered without any violation of established 
sequences so far as they fall under human observation. 
God causes a wind to arise; but this was by the 
condensation of vapor, according to the natural law. 
The vapor was raised by the action of heat, the 
natural process. Carry these explanations to the 
uttermost limits to which science can push its observa- 
tions, all might move in strictly undeviating order. 
But ulterior to this there is a “deep and dark abyss 
between the furthest reach of man’s discovery, and the 
forthgoings of God’s will,” where the finger of the 
Almighty touches the mechanism of the world.* 

It is worth while to stop and inquire, what precisely 
is meant by the uniformity of Nature? It is not 
meant that the phenomena which we now witness have 
always existed, or will always exist in the future. It 
is not supposed that the sun has always risen and set, 
as is the fact at present; and it would be impossible to 
prove, if any one believes, that the sun will continue 
to rise and set to all eternity in the future. What is 
the history of Nature but a record of perpetual 


* Natural Theology, Vol. II., p. 339. 


140 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


changes—new beings, new phenomena, and -new collo- 


cations of phenomena, presenting themselves on the 


scene. ‘To this extent, our expectation that the future 
will be like the past is subject to qualification. 

No doubt, we believe that the same assemblage of 
antecedents will be followed by the same consequent. 


That is to say, there are laws of Nature. On this 


assumption, inductive reasoning is founded. It would 
be a flagrant violation of logic, however, to infer that 
miracles have never occurred. A miracle, as Mr. Mill 


has remarked, supposes the introduction of a new 


antecedent, the volition of God; and the presence or 
absence of the antecedent is shown by the effect pro- 
duced. If this effect surpass that which the physical 
antecedents have been shown by experience to be capa- 


ble of producing, the new antecedent must be pre- 


supposed. Now Nature is not uniform in the sense. 


that miracles have not occurred, or in the sense that 


they may not, if God so will, occur hereafter. An epl- 4 
leptic son, who had been afflicted with this terrible — 3 


disorder from childhood, was brought by his father to 


Jesus, and was immediately cured by Him (Mark ix. 


17-28). This is a perfectly well-attested historical 


fact. Disbelieve it (and other like facts in connection _ 


with it), and you cannot account for the existence of 


the Christian Church, a fact not less substantial and . 


stupendous than the solar system. Generally speak- 


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THE HOSPITAL-TEST. 141 


ing, answers to prayer, on the view presented above, 
lack one element of a miracle; the supernatural inter- 
position is not manifest, palpable to the senses. But 
the cause is the same, and the effect, viz., a modifica- 
tion of the course of Nature, is the same. Can a 
theist suppose that such interpositions are not possible? 
To say that God is put in fetters by natural law, which 
is only His own habitual procedure, is to make Him 
a slave to habit. If He “makes the rain to fall,” He 
can send it or withhold it, as He deems best. Nature 
is flexible in His hand. The distinction of the natural 
and the supernatural is made for certain purposes; but 
the natural 7s supernatural. 

It is said that, as a matter of fact, prayers for 
physical changes are not answered. Whether they 
could be or not, it is said that, in point of fact, 
they are not. But this assertion stands without 
proof. 

It has been proposed to test the efficacy of prayer 
for the recovery of the sick by experiments in a hospi- 
tal. This is the so-called “ prayer-gauge.” This would 
be to test the benevolence of a Ruler or Benefactor—or 
one thought to be such—by bringing to him petitions 


to see whether he would grant them or not. This ex- 


periment would be apt to fail of its end if it were tried 
even upon a man reported to be goodand kind. The 


proper quality of prayer, that it shall be heart-felt 


142 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


petition, offered in faith, and having no ulterior motive 
beyond a desire of the good sought, is wanting. The 


experiment is vitiated from the start by a disregard of 


the conditions essential to the idea of true prayer. 
Another difficulty with the hospital-test is that such an 
experiment, independently of the objection just named, 
would be an utterly insufficient basis for an induction 
relative to the utility of prayer. Prayer does not 
operate like a natural force. If fire burns once, on the 
principle of the uniformity of Nature we infer that it 
will burn again, and as often as the experiment is 
repeated. But petitions do not act with this invariable 
eficiency. There may be reasons why they should be 
granted here, and denied there. The materials for 
induction are complex, and scattered over a vast area. 
Besides, they are not of a nature to be tested in the 
crucible, or weighed in the balance. Who can judge 
of the character. of a particular suppliant, and estimate 
the degree of likelihood that he will be heard? It 
must be confessed that the crude attempt to apply an 
experimental test to devotion has its parallel in the 
practice of those who undertake to demonstrate the 
efficacy of prayer by special instances, where none of 


the criteria of logical induction—such a& discrimina- 


tion between effects and coincidences, or the impar- 


tial gathering of facts in a sufficient number—are 


present. A man may be convinced for himself, and 


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GROUNDS FOR FAITH IN PRAYER. 143 


on sufficient grounds, of “the unbounded might” * of 
prayer, when the means of logically establishing the 
fact to the satisfaction of another are not at hand. 

To avoid the objections to the “hospital-test,” it has 
been proposed to appeal to statistics, and to inquire 
whether facts gathered from observation warrant the 
conclusion that supplications for long life have had an 
effect. But here the circumstances are so complicated 
as to baffle calculation. If prayer for long life tends to 


produce longevity, it is only one out of various causes 


which may go to determine the result. Prayers are 
offered by religious men for others not less than for 
themselves. Good men do not always pray for long 
life. The elements of a statistical estimate, then, are 
wanting. The phenomena are not observable to such 
an extent and in such form as to furnish a basis for an 
inductive conclusion. Science does not contradict 
faith; but it is impracticable to resolve faith into 
science. 
If it is possible for God to answer prayers, even for 
physical changes, and if there is no proof that He does 
not, what reason is there for believing that He will? 
The first is that prayer has the same foundation in hu- 
man nature that religion has, of which it forms an es- 


* From Wordsworth’s Excursion, b. i. 


+ This is clearly set forth by an ingenious writer, Mr. G. J. 
Romanes, Christian Prayer and General Laws, etc., p. 259. 


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444 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. = 
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sential part. There is a well-nigh irrepressible instinct Ee 
which impels men to call upon the Author and Ruler 
of the world, the Father of the spirits of all flesh, fa 
help, and for deliverance in trouble. They believe that _ 
He can meet their need, even if they cannot tell hows 
and sooner than give up this faith, they will suspect, — 
if they cannot detect, fallacies in fine-spun arguments 
to prove the contrary. The second reason is the au- 
thority of Revelation. Prayer is there encouraged by 
injunction and example. The lordship of God over | 
material Nature is declared in tones that carry convic- ae 
tion to the soul, and is demonstrated by miracle, | a 
Christ Himself prayed. ee 


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V. 
JESUS WAS NOT A RELIGIOUS ENTHUSIAST. 


Those who disbelieve in the supernatural mission 
and authority of Christ can do so at present only by 
assuming that He was a religious Enthusiast. It is no 
longer pretended, as it was by some of those about 
Him, that He was a “deceiver” (Matt. xxvii 63, - 
John vii. 12.) He was either the self-deluded victim of 
his own imagination, or He was in truth the Son of 
God, sent by the Father, having “power on earth to 


forgive sins” (Matt. ix. 6). 


All who gave credence to the record of His miracles 
are thereby precluded from disbelieving in Him. This 
record cannot be set aside without our involving our- 


selves in a labyrinth of historical perplexities from 


which there are no means of escape. How shall we 
explain the existence of the record? How shall 


we divide the miracles from the teaching which 


is obviously authentic, and has them for its sub- 
ject or occasion? What could have moved the disci- 


ples to accept Him as Messiah without the expected 
7 145 


Peal i 18) FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


and proper signs of Messianic office, especially when 
their national and political aspirations were utterly 
disappointed ? 

But apart from the miracles, the character and cir- 
cumstances of Jesus are inconsistent with the idea that 
he was an Enthusiast, elated and bewildered by the 
dreams of fancy. ; . 
1. Self-searching was inevitable in the situation wn 


which He was placed. The question who He was, and 


whether there was any ground for His claims, was con- - 


stantly brought home to Him. Was it reasonable to 
believe in. Him—the same question that is agitated 
now, was agitated by everybody near Him. There 
were different opinions. His own kinsmen at first did 
not believe in Him. His townsmen were sceptical as 
to His claims. Some people said that he was in a 
league with Satan, and got help from him. The influ- 
ential classes were mostly incredulous and_ hostile; 
and their influence was great among the common peo- 


ple. Many were perplexed, and knew not what to 


think. ‘The question respecting Himself was thus per- 
petually thrust upon His attention. But He showed 
no disposition to shun the inquiry, or to escape from 
self-scrutiny. We find Him, in the calmest manner 
possible, asking His disciples whom the people took 
Him to be. Having been told what the different sup- 
positions were, He goes on to interrogate them as to 


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JESUS NOT AN ENTHUSIAST. 147 


their own idea of Him: “ Whom say ye that Iam?” 
(Matt. xvi. 15). Then we find Him predicting that 
His adherents, even His chosen disciples, will be 
moved to desert Him. Nothing was wanting in His 
circumstances to call out misgivings in His own mind, 
had there been any ground for them. 

2. The sobriety of His conviction respecting Himself 
is made manifest wm the ordeal through which He 
passed in His trial and crucifixion. When He is 
forsaken by all, will not His confidence in Himself 
waver? Will He not see now that He is not what 
He thought Himself to be? Mark His demeanor! 
Carried from one priest to another, and from priest to 
governor, from Pilate to Herod, and back again to 
Pilate, He “answers not a word.” Is this because 
there is a doubt of Himself? No: He breaks silence 
to avow to the High Priest that He is in truth the 
Son of God; and to explain to the Roman Procurator, 
that, though a King, His kingdom was not one that 
could possibly involve rebellion against the civil autho- 
rity. The look which He cast upon Peter, a look of 
sad rebuke, implied an unshaken confidence in the 
truth of all His claims, at the very moment when they . 
were the object of all sorts of contempt and ridicule, 
and were bringing upon Him a violent death at the 
hands of the authorities of His nation. The few words 
to the thief at His side on the cross, the prayer for the 


148 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


fanatics who were destroying Him, His last words 
commending His departing spirit to the Father, in- 
volve the same undoubting consciousness of His excep- 
tional character and office among men, which had 
attended Him at every moment of His career. It was 


a terrible test for pretensions that rested on fancy. 
In the fire of it, one would have supposed that they — 


must shrivel away; that, if never before, He must 
have been exposed to Himself, and have seen through 
Himself. 


38. The holy character of Christ excludes the suppo- 


sition of religious enthusiasm. Self-exaggeration, even 
when it takes the form of enthusiasm, springs out of a 
root of moral evil. It has its ultimate origin in self- 
seeking. As Jesus Himself said: If the eye be single, 
the whole body will be full of light; a man will know 
himself. Hence enthusiasm, if balked in its aims, will 
often assume the form of conscious ambition, or turn 
into knavery. This is seen in popular leaders, like 
Mohammed, who begin as enthusiasts, but end worse 
than they began. The enormous self-delusion implied 
in the exalted pretensions of Jesus, in case they were 
not founded in truth, would have broken up the sobri- 
ety of His spirit, and deranged the harmony of His 
character. The safeguard against self-deception is 
thorough moral rectitude, by which all unhealthy and 
unreasonable self-exaltation is kept out. It is clear 


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JESUS NOT AN ENTHUSIAST. 149 


that the absolute purity and humility of Jesus ensure 
the truthfulness of His estimate of Himself. 

4, [His anticipations respecting the effect of His work, 
as the event has proved, were not enthusiastic. What 
He said of the “much fruit” that would follow if the 
corn of wheat should fall into the ground, and die (John 
xii. 24), has been verified. He was in truth lifted up 
to draw all men unto Him. He was the founder of a 
unique and. mighty kingdom, to which history affords 
no parallel, as He foresaw just at the moment when He 
stood alone, mocked, and scourged, and crowned with 
thorns, with a reed placed in His hand for a sceptre. 
None of the wise men of the world at that moment 
would have given the slightest credit to His prediction 
of the consequences of His work and of His death. 
They would have disregarded them as a ridiculous, 
hypocritical boast, or a madman’s dream. But history 
has pronounced its verdict, and that verdict is that 
they corresponded to the coming reality. Was it 
intoxicated imagination, then, that governed him? or 
was it the calmest, the truest, the profoundest wisdom? 
Was that consciousness a nest of delusive fancies 
respecting Himself, or was it a clear, just perception of 
what He really was, and of the work which God had 
given Him to do? 


VI. 


THE MORAL AND SPIRITUAL ELEMENTS IN 
THE ATONEMENT. 


The problem of the Atonement is to determine how 


the work of Christ influences God to forgive sin. How 
does it move Him to receive back into His fellowship 
and favor those who, notwithstanding their guilt for 
the past, and their remaining sin, betake themselves to 
Christ, cordially avail themselves of His intercession, 
and give themselves up to Him to be moulded in His 
image? The effect on the mind of God, especially on 
the retributive feeling in His nature, which stands in 
the way of the practical exercise of mercy, is the 
question of main difficulty. 

Some of the ideas of President Edwards on this sub- 
ject are of deep interest, and merit more attention than 
they have ever received.* My object is not to present 
his entire view, some parts of which are more open to 
criticism than others, but to set forth briefly certain 
leading points in his discussion. 

* They are in his “ Miscellaneous Remarks,” ete., Dwight’s ed., 


V ol V LT 
150 


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EDWARDS ON THE ATONEMENT. 151 


Where there is sin, something of the nature of com- 
pensation is required; either punishment, or a repent- 
ance, humiliation, and sorrow which are proportionate 
to the guilt incurred. This fitness of punishment (or 
of an equivalent repentance) is founded on the abhor- 
rence and indignation which sin necessarily excites. 
Since punishment is a part of the fitness of things, is 
the correlate of ill-desert, the justice of God obliges 
Him to inflict it. Edwards explains the significance 
of punishment as consisting in the contradiction af- 
forded by it to the implied language of sin, which is 
that God is not worthy to be respected and obeyed. 
Here there is some resemblance to suggestive remarks 


of Anselm respecting the proof of subjection to God, 


which the transgressor in suffering punishment in- 


voluntarily affords. Anselm speaks of God, and His 
will. Applying his idea to the law, we might say that 
the transgressor does not escape from its grasp by the 
revolt of his will against it. The law, cast off as a 
precept, lays hold of him with its punitive clutch. 
He flies from one side to the other, but the horizon 
ever surrounds him. No repentance answerable to the 
guilt of sin is possible to men. The reason of this, 
according to Edwards, is the infinite guilt of sin, as 
committed against an infinite being. Those who are 
not satisfied with this idea of the infinitude of guilt, 
might, perhaps, prefer to rest the impossibility of ade- 


152 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


quate repentance on other grounds,—as the power of 
sinful habit partially to benumb conscience and para- 
lyze the will. 

Let the case be supposed of an enormous and long- 
continued wrong committed against me by another; 
‘though at length he should leave it off, I should not 
forgive him, unless upon Gospel considerations.” 

But suppose an Intercessor comes forward, (1) a 
dearer friend to me, (2) always true and constant to 
me, (3) a near relation of the offender, and (4) under- 
goes hard labors and difficulties, pains and miseries to 
procure him forgiveness; and (5) the offender seeks 
favor in his name, flies to him, and is sensible how 
much the mediator has done and suffered, I should be 


satisfied and be inclined to receive him back to friend- - 


ship. 

The Intercessor may be called the Patron, the 
offender the Client, and the offended party the Friend 
of the patron. Merit is anything in one that recom- 
mends him to another’s esteem, regard or affection. 

It is reasonable to show respect or grant favors to 
one on account of his services to, or connection with, 
another. The stricter the union, the more does it pre- 
vail to the acceptance of the person, for the sake of 
him to whom he is united. There are many familiar 
illustrations of this law or principle of our nature. If 
the union be such that the two can be taken as com- 


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EDWARDS ON THE ATONEMENT. 193 


pletely one and the same, as to the interest of the 
client in relation to the patron, the patron may be 
taken as the substitute of the client, and the merits of 
the client may be imputed to him. 

What degree of union is complete? When the 
patron is willing to take the client's destruction on 
himself, or what is equivalent to that, so that the client 
may escape: who is thus willing for the reason that his 
love puts him into the place of the client. Such love 
takes in the client’s whole interest, is an equal balance 
for it, puts him thoroughly in the client's stead. Their 
interest becomes identical. 

Especially is the client’s welfare regarded for the 
patron’s sake, when the patron expresses his desire for 
the client's welfare by being at the expense of his own 
personal and private welfare for the welfare of the 
client. The interest in the good expended is trans- 
ferred into the good sought. The good of the price is 
parted with, for the good of the thing purchased : 
a proper substitution of one in the place of the other. 

Especially, again, is the client’s welfare regarded for 
the patron’s sake, if the patron not only expresses 


his desires of the client’s welfare, and that what is ex- 


pended for him be given to him; but if, also, the merit 
of the patron consists and appears in what he does for 
the client’s welfare—if his merit has its existence for 
the sake of the clrent. 


154 FAITH AND_RATIONALISM. 


It is still more rational to accept the patron’s merit 
if he goes where the client is, clothes himself in his 
form, is made like him in all respects, etc..—his own 
merit, it being carefully observed, remaining all the 
while inviolable. 

The union of the patron and client must not infringe 
on two things,—the patron’s union with the friend 
whose favor'he seeks for the client, and the patron’s 
own merit. For his recommending influence is in two 
things: (1) his merit, and (2) his union with the client. 

The patron must appear united to his unworthy and 
offending client, under such circumstances as to demon- 
strate that he perfectly disapproves of the offence, and 
to show a perfect regard to virtue, and to the honor 
and dignity of his offended, injured friend. 

This can be done in no way so thoroughly as by put- 
ting himself in the stead of the offender, under the vio- 
lated law and rule of righteousness, and suffering the 
whole penalty due to the offender, and by himself, un- 
der such self-denial, honoring those violated rights and 
rules. Hereby he gives testimony to all beholders that, 
notwithstanding his love to his client, he would rather 
deny himself so greatly rather than see the welfare, 
authority, honor, and dignity of his friend, diminished 
or degraded. 

If the dignity of the patron, taken in connection with 
his friend’s regard for him, and his union to the client, 


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EDWARDS ON THE ATONEMENT. 155 
| 


countervail the favor which the client needs, then there 
is a sufficiency in the patron to be the representative 
and substitute of the client. 

If the patron and client are equals as to greatness of 
being or degree of existence, and the patron is so unit- 
ed with the client that he regards the interest of the 
client equally with his own personal interest, then his 
client’s welfare becomes perfectly, and to all intents and 
purposes, his own interest, as much as his own personal 
welfare; and his friend will regard the client's welfare 
in an equal degree with the patron’s welfare. 

If the patron is greater than the client, then a less 
degree of union has the same effect on the friend. 

Such a union may most fitly and aptly be represent- 
ed by the client’s being taken by the patron to be a 
part or member of himself, as though he were a mem- 
ber of his body. 

When the suffering of the patron for the client is 
equal in value or weight to the client’s suffering, con- 
sidering the difference of the degree of persons, it shows 
that the love to the client is equal or equivalent to his 
love to himself, according to the different degree of the 
persons. 

The client must actively and cordially concur in the 
affair. There must be towards the patron the feelings 
and acts appropriate to this relation; he must cleave 
to him, commit his cause to him, trust in him, approv- 


156 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ing of his friendship, kind undertaking and patronage; 
also, he must feel an approbation of the patron’s union 
to his friend, whose favor he seeks; also, an approba- 
tion of the benefits which ‘the patron seeks of his friend 
for the client. 

‘The mediator must unite Himself to God and man ; 
or, as it were, assume them both to Himself But if 
He unites Himself to guilty men, of necessity, He 
brings their guilt—i. e. exposedness to penal evil—on 
Himself; He must take the rebel’s sufferings on Him- 


self, “because otherwise His undertaking for, and unit-— 


ung himself to such an one, will appear like counte- 


nancing his offence and rebellion.” If He takes it up- | 


on Himself to bear the penalty, He quite takes off this 
appearance. 

Christ suffered the wrath of God for men’s sins in 
such a way as a perfectly holy person would who knew 
that God was not angry with him personally, but loved 
him. Christ bore the wrath of God in two ways: 1, 


He had a clear sight of the wrath of God against the — 


sins of men, and the punishment they deserved. 2. 
He endured the effects of that wrath. 

Without the sight of the odiousness of sin and the 
dreadfulness of punishment, He could not know how 
great a benefit He procured for them in redeeming 
them from this punishment. He had this sight, be- 
cause sin fully revealed its odiousness in murdering the 


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EDWARDS ON THE ATONEMENT. 157 


Son of God, and everything in the circumstances of 
His last suffering was adapted to heighten this impres- 
sion. This view of sin was, to Christ, a most painful 
sensation; it was immense suffering, not being bal- 
anced or neutralized by other feelings of an opposite 
nature; since God forsook Him, 2. ¢., took away these 
feelings. So Christ bare our sins, and, also, suffered 
wrath, or had a sense of the dreadfulness of the pun- 


ishment of sin. ‘A very strong and lively love and 


pity towards the miserable, tends to make their case 
ours; as in other respects, so in this in particular, as 
it doth in our idea place us in their stead, under their 
misery, with a most lively sense of the feeling of that 
misery; as it were, feeling it for them, actually suffer- 
ing in their stead by strong sympathy.” 

Christ was sanctified in His last suffering; first, as 
He had a great sense of the odiousness of sin, and, 
secondly, as He had that experience of the bitter fruit 
and consequence of it. Moreover, He was then in the 
exercise of the highest act of obedience or holiness, 


which tended to increase the principle. This suffering 


“added to the finite holiness of the human nature of 
Christ.” It was like fire which increased the precious- 
ness of the gold, though it burned away no dross. 
Christ endured the effects of the wrath of God. Satan 
and wicked men were left free—‘ let loose —to inflict 
upon Him pain. God forsook Him; 1. ¢., withheld 


158 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


pleasant ideas and manifestations of His love, Ghrist, — 9am 


_ thus tasted in His inward experience the terror and dis- 
may of souls forsaken of God, though Himself con- 
sciously free from guilt. 

I remark upon these statements of Edwards: 


1. Christ is first presented in them in the character’ 


of an Intercessor. Nor is this conception entirely 
dropped out of mind in the process of the discussion. 
As a prerequisite to this office, He must enter fully into 
the mind of the offended party, as well as the distress of 
the party offending. This absolute sympathy, or iden- 
tification of Himself in feeling, with both parties, is 
necessary to qualify Him to intercede. Without it, 
His intercessions would not be intelligent on His own 
part, or acceptable, and prevailing. 

2. The sympathy of Christ with God and with man, the 
offended One and the offender, was perfected by means 
of His death. Then and thereby it attained to its 
consummation. Then He understood fully what guilt 
involves; He appreciated both the holy resentment of 
God, and the criminality and forlorn situation of 
man. We do not depart from the spirit of Edwards's 
teaching, if we say that the prayer of Christ for His 
enemies, on the cross, emanated from a state of mind 
that absolutely meets the conditions of acceptable in- 


tercession. 


3. The substitution of Christ was primarily in His 2 


EDWARDS ON THE ATONEMENT. 159 


own heart. It was love, which comes under another’s 
burden, makes another’s suffering lot its own, lays aside 
self, as it were, and becomes another. ‘This ,inward 
substitution led to, and was completed in, the final act 
of self-sacrifice. 

4, By His voluntary submission to death, Christ 
signified His absolute approval of the righteousness of 
the law, on its penal, as well as its preceptive side. He 
gave the strongest possible proof of His sense of the 
justice of the divine administration in the allotment of 
death to the sinner. Being among men, and one of 
them, He honored and sanctioned the law both by 
keeping it, by overcoming temptation, and also, by 
sharing, without a murmur, in the righteous penalty 


which He had not personally incurred. 


The originality and attractiveness of Edwards's dis- 
cussion lies in the circumstance that it is an attempt to 
find the moral and spiritual elements of the Atonement, 
and thus unfold its rationale. It isnot in the quantity 
of the Saviour’s suffering alone, but in the sources and 
meaning of it, that he is interested. While holding 
that Christ suffered the penalty of sin, Edwards not 
only carefully excludes the idea that He was in con- 
sciousness, or in fact, an object of wrath; but he dwells 
also upon those spiritual perceptions and experiences 
which gave significance to the pain which He endured. 


160 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


Dr. J. McLeod Campbell, in a treatise on the Atone- 


ment, which for its depth and religious earnestness 
has commanded general respect, starts with the alter- 


native of Edwards, that sin must be followed by punish- 
ment, or by an adequate repentance. Discarding the © 
idea that the Atonement is the bearing of the penalty, 


he regards it as an adequate repentance effected in the 
consciousness of Christ, the ingredient of personal 
remorse being absent, but all the spiritual elements 
being present which Edwards finds in the experience of 
Christ. Christ made an expiatory confession of our 
sins, which was “a perfect Amen in humanity to the 
judgment of God on the sin of man.” * Faith is our 
“Amen” to this condemnation in the soul of Christ. 
Christ enters fully into the mind of God respecting 
sin; into His condemnation of it, and into His love 
to the sinner. There was “the equivalent repentance” 
which Edwards makes the alternative of punishment. 


With this, sanctioned, reproduced in its essential ele- 


ments, in the believer, through his connection with 
Christ, God is satisfied. 


Dr. Campbell goes beyond the Moral View of the — 


Atonement. He makes the death of Christ necessary 
to the realization by Him of God’s feeling and man’s 
need. Without “the perfected experience of the en- 
mity of the carnal mind to God,” “an adequate con- 


* The Nature of the Atonement, etc., 3d ed., p. 186. 


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CAMPBELL ON THE ATONEMENT. 161 


fession of man’s sin” could not have “ been offered to 


God in humanity in expiation of man’s sin, nor inter- 


cession have been made according to the extent of 


man’s need of forgiveness.” * Moreover, it is declared - 
that Christ endured, and that it was necessary to the 
development of His inward experience that He should 
endure, death, under a sense of its character as “ the 
wages of sin.” “As our Lord alone truly tasted death, 
so to Him alone had death its perfect meaning as the 


wages of sin, for in Him alone was there full entrance 


into the mind of God towards sin, and perfect unity 
with that mind.” + Christ, as being alone holy, could 
alone understand, and duly feel, what the forfeiting of 
life means. If men were mere spirits, a response to 
the divine mind concerning sin could only have had 
spiritual elements; but man being capable of death, 
and death being the wages of sin, it was not simply sin 
that had to be dealt with, but “an existing law with 
its penalty of death, and that death as already in- 
curred.” Hence a response was necessary to “that 
expression of the divine mind which was contained in 
God’s making death the penalty of sin.” { The cha- 
racteristic of Campbell’s view is that suffering as such, 
he regards as of no account, but suffering and death 
are necessary as a conditio sine qua non of that enter- 
ing into the mind of God—that expiatory confession— 


P2389. 7 P. 302. ft P. 303, 


162 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


which he considers the moral essence of the Atonement. 
Yet, it will be observed that, according to this repre- 
sentation Christ endures death, and with a vivid, pain- 
ful, complete consciousness of the penal quality that 
belongs to it. How could this death come nearer to 
being identical with penalty, save by the introduction 
of an element of personal remorse or self-accusation, 
which Edwards equally excludes ? 

I make one further criticism upon Campbell. He 
brings out with great force and impressiveness the 
significance of the Saviour’s intercessory prayer on the 
eross, with the confession of human guilt implied in it, 
as a full revelation of the righteous displeasure of God 
against sin, and at the same time, of His love and 
merciful inclination towards the sinner, which are pre- 
supposed in that supplication. There is a revelation 
of God’s holy anger and His mercy; involving, to be 
sure, intense suffering in Him through whom it is 
made, in the act of making it. I am not certain that 
Campbell would confine the value of this confession 
and prayer of Christ to their significance as a revelation 
of God’s mind, which we can lay hold of, and respond 
to with humble, grateful hearts. This, however, is the 
predominant representation in the treatise. Why not 


consider the supplication of Christ as, also, a real 


means of procuring the good sought? Why not consider 


the actual bestowal of grace—not the disposition to be- 


- 


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LUTHER ON THE ATONEMENT. 163 


stow it—as consequent on the intercession? The in- 
tercession presupposes, indeed, that God is merciful; 
but so does all prayer. And yet the idea of prayer 
is nullified if we do not hold that it procures, or 
tends to procure, a good not otherwise to be ex- 
pected. 

Those who have read Luther’s Commentary on the 
- Galatians will remember how earnestly he insists on 
the truth of Christ’s unification of Himself with us, 
-and of the unification of ourselves with Him through 
faith. In all the writings of Luther which bear on the 
subject, the same thought is prominent. Amid impor- 
tant diversities, there is yet a fundamental resemblance 
between his conception of the moral and spiritual ele- 
- ments of the Atonement, and that of Edwards. As 
regards what is conceived to have taken place in the 
soul of Christ, the two theologians have much in com- 
mon. Dorner has clearly set forth Luther's ideas on 
- this theme.* The soul of the Reformer entered deeply 
into the crushing feeling of guilt, as distinguished from 
that of misery or finite weakness. In this feeling, we 
first appreciate our unworthiness, but at the same time 
understand the value of our personality in the eyes of 
God. The longing for expiation or atonement involves 
- the first pure ethical impulse. Conscious of our help- 


lessness, our inability to make an atonement ourselves, 


* Lehre y. d. Person Christi, i1. 513 seq. 


164 _ FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


we are met by the joyful tidings of a Mediator, sent 3 
from God, and of a righteousness in Him, which cor-. 


responds to the divine righteousness. This righteous- 
ness, although, in the first instance it is His, may also 
become ours through faith; faith being the personal 
assent and affirmation which we give to that Love on 
His part which takes our place, to its righteousness, 


holiness, and power. This substitution on His part — 


carries in it so high a respect for us as individuals, for 
our personality, that it does not aim to do away with 
it, or to absorb it. The aim is, rather, to present it as 
righteous before God in a substitution which shall act 


upon it, recognizing it all the time as a separate person- 


ality, while the individual, on his side, gives himself up ~ 
to Christ in faith, to be moulded by His plastic influence — 


into the divine image, to be transformed into a child of 
God—a child in whom, reconciled and made holy, the 
righteousness of God attains to a personal manifesta- 
tion. By faith we are drawn into the spiritual death 
of penitence, through the consciousness of being con- 


demned in Him, but not without at the same time 


becoming aware of the divine will to save us—save © 


our personal being itself—as reconciled in. Christ. ~ 


Luther states that before the Evangelical doctrine was 
brought out, preachers aimed to depict to their hearers 
the sufferings of Christ for the purpose of exciting 


their pity, and to rhake them weep. This, he says, is _ 


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LUTHER ON THE ATONEMENT. 165 


wrong. We make the right use of Christ’s sufferings, 
when we are led, by seeing Christ so sorrowful on our 
account, to sorrow for ourselves, for the sins that made 
Him mourn and suffer. We are to mourn over our- 
selves, and not over Him. His contrition in our be- 
half should make us contrite. Christ is to Luther the 
Child of God, who offers Himself to our faith that we 
may be clothed upon with divine sonship. God gives 
to us His Son, and tells us that He is well pleased 
with all that Christ says and does for us. “ Thinkest 
thou not that if a human heart truly felt that good- 
pleasure which God has in Christ when He thus serves 
us, it would for very joy burst into a hundred thous- 
and pieces? For then it would see into the abyss of 
the fatherly heart, yea into the fathomless and eternal 
goodness and love of God, which He feels towards us, 
and has felt from eternity?” “ God’s good-pleasure 
and his whole heart thou seest in Christ, in all His 
words and works;” and in turn Christ is in God's 
heart, and an object of His good-pleasure. Since Christ 
- igs thine and mine, we, too, are in the same good-pleas- 
ure of God, and as deep in His heart as Christ Him- 
self. “ We must first be in Christ, with all our nature, 
sin, death, and weakness, and know that we are freed 
therefrom, and redeemed, and pronounced blessed by 
this Christ. We must swing above ourselves and be- 


yond ourselves over upon Him, yea, be utterly incor- 


166 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


porated in Him, and be His own.” Then sin, and fear, 
and death are gone: “I know of no death or hell. 
For I know that as Christ is in the Father, I am, also, 
in Christ.” ‘In fine, by the word we become incor- 
porated in Christ, so that all that He has is ours, and we 
can take Him on, as our own body. Hein turn must 
take on Himself all that which befalls us, so that 
neither the world, the devil, nor any calamity can hurt 
or overcome us.” ‘One must teach of faith correctly 
—even thus—that by it you become bound and united 
with Christ, so that out of Him and you there arises, 


as it were, one person, which does not suffer the two to 


be parted or sundered from one another, but where 


you evermore hang on Christ, and can say with joy 


and comfort--‘I am Christ; not personally ; but Christ's 


righteousness, victory, life, and everything which He 


has, is my own;’ and so that Christ can say—‘I am 
this poor sinner, that is all his sin and death are my 
sins and my death, since he hangs on me by faith, I on 
him,’—therefore, St. Paul says, ‘we are members of 
Christ’s body, of His flesh and His bones.’ Wherefore 
when you in this affair separate your person and that 
of Christ from one another, you are under the law and 
live not in Christ.” “ Christ has taken on our flesh, 


which is full of sin, and has felt all woe and calamity, 


has demeaned Himself not otherwise before God, His 


Father, than if He had Himself done all the sin which 


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LUTHER ON THE ATONEMENT. 167 


we have done, and as if He had deserved all that — 
which we have deserved.” Phil. u. 

The doctrine of Luther is that the uncreated Son of 
God has entered into human nature, has become man, 
has thus closely united Himself to us, has, in the full- 
ness of His love and sympathy, taken upon His heart 
the whole burden of man as a sinner, has taken us up 
into His heart, making our case absolutely His own, 
has bewailed our sins before God, and died as if He 
had been Himself a sinner; that the end of all is to 
fashion us like Himself, into the image of God as His 
children; that in all this love to us and service in our 
behalf, the Father is well pleased, and receives us in 
Christ, provided we accept Him, cordially recognize the 
meaning of His grief, and giving up, as it were, our 
isolated individuality, surrender ourselves to Him to 
‘be moulded into the likeness of His Sonship. All 
things that belong to God are His, and all things 
that are His are ours. What Christ becomes and does 
for us, as our representative, 1s eventually reproduced 


through Him within us. 


We pass from Luther to Schleiermacher. To Schlei- 
ermacher, Christ is the Source of a new spiritual Jife 
of communion with God, first realized in the Saviour 
Himself, and from Him communicated to those who 


are drawn out of themselves into fellowship with Him. 


168 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


He is compared to. an individual in whom the idea of 
the State should first come to consciousness, and who 
should gather the unorganized mass of men from the 
state of nature into a civil community by taking them 


up into a participation in this new life—the life of citi- — 


zenship. The redemptive agency of Christ consists in 
the imparting to men, through the attractive power 
which He exerts upon them, that inward consciousness 
of fellowship with God (Gottesbewusstsein) which in 
Him is absolutely controlling, and holds every other 
feeling in due subordination to itself, His atoning 
work is the communication to them of His own undis- 
turbed blessedness, which is the. concomitant of. this 
filial communion with God. Christ receives the 
believer to be a partaker of His holiness and blessed- 


ness—of His inward spiritual life. He acts upon men 


to this end. God looks upon the sinner, not as he 1s 


actually, but as he is in virtue of his relation to 
Christ, as he is ideally, as he will be when the pro- 
cess which has begun is complete. Sin still exists 
in him, but as a vanishing element. 

The union of the believer to Christ brings the for- 


giveness of sin; since, the principle of sin being itself _ 


destroyed at the root, sin being driven, as it were, 
from the centre to the circumference of the character, 
evil or pain does not break up the harmony of the 
inward life; if the disciple suffered, the Master suffered 


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SCHLEIERMACHER. 169 


likewise: and evil, including death, loses its punitive 
aspect, and is transmuted into chastisement, or a mer- 
ciful infliction. Forgiveness does not free from suffer- 
ing; it simply changes its effect and its significance. 
The sufferings of Christ are not directly essential to 
His work as a Saviour. They are needful, first, as 
His devotion to the work of founding the new king- 
dom could be manifested in its fullness only by His 
not giving way to the utmost resistance, even to that 
which involved the destruction of His person; and, 
secondly, because His blessedness could only appear in 
its perfection in the continuance of it through the most 
extreme suffering, even that which grew out of the with- 
standing of sin, and out of His own fellow-feeling with 
sinful men, which attended this most bitter experience. 

In the exposition of the priestly office of Christ, 
Schleiermacher fully develops the ideas sketched above. 
“The fact that only what Christ does corresponds per- 
fectly to the divine will, and expresses purely and com- 
pletely the reign of godliness (Gottesbewusstsevn) in 
human nature, is the foundation of our relation to Him ; 
and on the recognition of this everything that is distince- 
tively Christian rests. In this is included the fact that, 
independently of his connection with Christ, neither any 
individual man, nor any particular part of the collective 
life of humanity, in any era, is, in and of itself, righteots 
before God, or an object of His approbation.” “In liy- 


170 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


ing fellowship with Christ, no one will be, or will be 
considered by God, anything for itself; but every one 
will appear only as inspired by Him, and as a portion, 
in the process of development, of His work.” He is 
like the High Priest in relation to the people; God 
looks on them asin Him. “ His pure will to fulfill 


the divine will is, by means of the vital fellowship be-— 


tween Him and us, operative in us, and we thus have 

part in His perfection, if not in the actual realization, 

nevertheless in the stimulus and spur (antried).” 

Christ has actually fulfilled the will of God, therefore, 

“not in our stead, but for our benefit.” As concerns 
tc 


the passive obedience, or sufferings, of Christ, “in 


every human community, so far as it can be considered 
yi Ne 


a distinct whole, there is as much evil as there is sin; so - 


that, to be sure, evil is the punishment of sin; not, 
however, in the sense that each individual suffers com- 
pletely and exclusively just the evil which stands in 
connection with his personal sin. Therefore, in every 
case where another suffers evils which are not connect- 
ed with his own sin, it can be said that he suffers 
punishment for others, who, since the sin, as the cause 
and fountain of evil, has exhausted itself, are no longer 
smitten with evils in consequence of it. Since Christ, 
in order to take us up into the fellowship of His life, 
must enter into the fellowship of our life which is sin- 


- ful, where sin is continually begetting suffering and 


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‘\SCHLEIERMACHER. 171 


evil, He suffered for the entire human race; for to the 
whole race He chose to ally Himself. As High Priest, 


moreover, His sympathy with human guilt and ill-desert, 
or His sympathetic apprehension of it, which was the 
‘motive of His redemptive work, reached its highest 


pitch when it inspired Him to undergo death at the 
hands of sinners. Here was His victory over sin; and 
with it, over evil which sin brings inits train. Hence, 
by the sufferings of Christ punishment may be said to 
be abolished, because in the communion of His blessed 


life, evil, which becomes a vanishing element, 1s no 


longer felt as a penalty. It is in His suffermgs that we 
behold His holiness, and His blessedness also, which 


are seen to be invincible under the severest test. By 


entering into His sufferings, the conviction of His 
holiness and blessedness is brought home to us. The 


suffering of Christ is vicarious, in that His sympathetic 


apprehension (mitgefihl) of sin 1s complete, even as 


regards those who are not themselves distressed by the 
consciousness of sin; and in the sense that, being 
Himself sinless, He is not under obligation to suffer. 
His sympathetic compassion for men as sinners is 
strong enough to take in all; it exhibits itself fully in 
His freely giving Himself up to death; and it serves ever 
to complete and perfect our imperfect consciousness of 
sin. Christ sustains a relation to us which renders 


Him the representative of the entire human race, in- 


Le? FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


asmuch as, in the character of a High Priest, He brings 


our prayers to God, and brings to us the divine bless- 
ing. He is the Priest whom all preceding priesthoods 
imperfectly foreshadow. He is the most perfect Media- 
tor between God and every separate portion of the 
human race, no one of whom, in and for himself, could 
be an object for God, or come into any connection with 
Him. In Hisconsciousness is the norm and the fountain 
of acceptable piety. ven the penitence which is ap- 
propriate for sin, finds its pattern and potence in His 
sympathetic sense of its evil.” * 


It is impossible not to be struck with the spirit- 


tual insight and scientific method, which mark Schlei- 
ermacher’s discussion of this subject. Christ, bring- 
ing into the race the life of holy and blessed com- 
munion with God; maintaining in Himself this life 
of filial love and of deep, inward peace consequent 
upon it, even in the midst of death inflicted by the 
malignity of men, into whose condition of sin and mis« 
ery He entered with an exhaustive sympathy; anni- 
hilating thus, by His holy constancy, sin as a princi- 
ple, and with it the suffering of which sin is the pa- 
rent, and which is put in the way of gradual extin- 
guishment; propagating this inward life, within the 
circle of His historic influence, by drawing sinful men 


up into the fellowship of His filial relation to God, and ~ 


* Glaubenslehre, II. 1, 3 51 seq. 


(is 
ope hagas ii ideal 


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x 


aif SCHLEIERMACHER. Lis 


thus giving them, too, the victory of the spirit over the 
flesh; lifting them, also, above the power of outward 
calamity to break the soul’s calm, and transmuting for 
them all outward suffering, including physical death, 
into a means of purification and peace—these ideas 
surely include an important part of the Gospel. 

But signal as are the merits, not less marked are 
the defects of Schleiermacher’s exposition. The sub- 
jective character of his theology, which appears, for 
example, in his confining piety to the sphere of 
feeling, and in his explication of prayer, and which im- 
parts a Pantheistic coloring to his entire system, 1s 
manifest in this discussion of the Atonement. Sin is 
not conceived of strictly as an abnormal element, but 
rather as a lower stage in human development. The 
end of the work of Christ is not so much to rescue, as 
to elevate, human nature. Hence the feeling of guilt, 
‘and its correlate, the conscientious anger of God, fail 
of a due recognition. When the principle of sin is 
~ broken in its control, it is conceived that guilt and the 
sense of guilt disappear of themselves. The new 
man puts away this feeling as not belonging to 
him, but toa former self. Guilt is really made to be 
a spur to an onward development, instead of being 
retrospective and retributive in its import. There- 
fore, the conscious need of expiation fails to be recog- 


nized in the deep power which is seen to belong to it 


174 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


in the mind of Christian and heathen alike. Accord. 
ing to Schleiermacher, the work of Christ, and His 
death as a part of it, delivers from sin, and delivers from 
punishment; but this last effect is within the sphere of 
the natural order, in the way of cause and effect, and 
not from any other influence upon the mind of God. 


Among the theologians who may be loosely desig- 
nated as of the Schleiermacherian school, one of the most 
original and suggestive is Rothe. The main points of 
his theory of the Atonement may be here stated. Re- 
demption must take away the consequence of sin to the 
transeressor, in his relation to God—his being under 
the wrath of God, or guilt and punishment. This is 
possible only through forgiveness. And redemption 
must take away sin itself, and restore in man the 
dominion of the opposite principle. oth elements 
mutually condition each other. God, on account of 
His holiness and righteousness, cannot forgive the sin- 
ner unless he is actually freed from sin; but, on the 
other hand, this last is impossible if the sinner is not 
first forgiven ; for so long as God repels him, he cannot 
turn to God, or get rid of sin. Here is an antinomy. 
Even the holiness and righteousness of God require 
this to be dissolved and removed; for these attributes 
are not content with the mere punishment of sin; they 
crave the actual destruction of sin itself, the termina- 


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ROTHE ON THE ATONEMENT. 175 


tion of its control in the hearts ofmen. So that, in 
case forgiveness is indispensable to this result, holiness 
and righteousness call for forgiveness; only they de- 
mand inexorably that pardon shall be granted in such 
a way as to carry in it, likewise, the holy reaction of 
God against sin, 7. ¢., these very feelings of holiness and 
righteousness. The solution of the antinomy is the 
Atonement, or the making of sin forgivable ; a modifi- 
cation in the relation between the sinner and God, 
in virtue of which God, notwithstanding His holi- 
ness and righteousness, can | forgive the sin which 
still cleaves to him, and, notwithstanding its presence, 
can enter into communion with him. There is only 
one way of effecting this result. If sin is to be for- 
given before it is actually removed or destroyed, God 
must have a guaranty, which is perfect, as inhering in 
_ the transaction itself, that sin will in the future be in 
fact wholly put away from the sinner, provided for- 


giveness is provisionally imparted to him, so that this 


as preliminary reception of pardon, this pardon by antici- 


pation, shall be itself the actual beginning of a con- 
tinuous process of purification from sin, which will at 
length be absolutely complete. If forgiveness can be 
thus the first step, the indispensable and sure ante- 
cedent, of the actual deliverance from sin itself, then, 
and then only, can the relation of God to the sinner be 


one in which God does not manifest wrath. Nay it 


176 FAITH AND RA TIONALISM. 


will become a relation in which even His holiness and 
righteousness require Him to receive the sinner, as 
reconciled, into communion and favor. Sin is so con- 
nected with sin, and man so connected with man, that 
this new possibility must come in with reference to the 
race of mankind as a whole. This possibility is 
created, with regard to the race and to individuals, by 
the perfecting of the second Adam, as Redeemer. In 
Him dwells the power sufficient for the actual abolition 
of sin in mankind, as a whole and ag individuals, and 
He has actually set on foot the historical process which 
will have this issue, it being presupposed that the an- 
ticipatory forgiveness of sin on the side of God takes 
place. In the case of every individual who by faith 
enters into fellowship with Christ, there is given to 


God a guaranty for his future complete emancipation 


from sin, and for the fact that his pardon is only the. 


initial step of the efficient process which is to remove 
sin in him, and to separate him wholly from it. By 
the Saviour, then, a foundation is laid for the recep- 
tion into the relation of fellowship with God of the old 
sinful humanity estranged from Him, and for an ethico- 
religious development which will more and more lead 
that humanity into the way of righteousness. 

-How has the Redeemer atoned for mankind ? 
Rothe answers, By qualifying Himself to be a Re- 
deemer. What was needed was a human being who 


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ROTHE ON THE ATONEMENT. Lee 


should be absolutely qualified completely to effect the 
abolition of sin, or the recovery of men from its influ- 
ence and control. Christ has developed Himself in an 
absolutely normal way to the point of perfection asa. 
“moral and spiritual being; and in doing so He has 
brought Himself into an absolute union, on the one 
hand with God, and, on the other, with the race of 


mankind. This is the completed sanctification of the 


Redeemer, by which He is specially fitted to be, in a 


perfectly adequate way, the cause and principle of our 


sanctification. The moral task which Jesus set before 
Him was that of a complete self-surrender to God, on 


' the one hand, and to man, on the other. He gave all 


that belonged to Him, including His own sensuous 
being, His life, as an offering to God, an offering of 
Himself, and to men as a self-sacrifice, for their best 
good, and out of love to them. This was a work done 
in and upon Himself, in the midst of trial, in success- 
ful combat with the Tempter of souls; but done for the 
sake of men. This work culminated in the voluntary 
endurance of death, which consummated the surrender 
of everything His own. This submission to death per- 
fected at once His union to God, and His union to men. 
Love could go no farther. This self-surrender, carried to 


an exhaustive accomplishment, involved the most stren- 


uous moral exertion on His part. Being a work under- 
taken entirely for our sake, it was vicarious: the holy 
&* 


178 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


One performed a work in the name of the sinner, 
which the sinner was incapable of performing for Him- 
self. Potentially in Him the old sinful race were 
regenerated; and He was, therefore, the representa- 
tive of mankind, and of every individual. His suffer- 
ing has its ground, not in Himself, the sinless One, but 
only in the sinfulness of the world, in which He had to 
fulfill the moral task of His life, and for the sake of 
which He fulfilled it. He shares the world’s suffer- 
ing, and thereby takes it away} since In overcoming 
sin, He overcomes evil, or suffering, the consequence 
of sin, and since, through His fellow-feeling with the 
sinful world, He felt sympathetically the sufferings 
that befell them, and which are properly not His—not 
His in the character which pertains to them in the 
mind of the ill-deserving who endure them—i. e. as 
- the penalty of sin. Thus He bore the penalties of our 
sins; not, however, as His own punishment, but as 
ours. He put Himself in feeling in our place, though 


without any confusion of consciousness, or self-accusa- 


tion. Unlike good men, martyrs, He endured suffer- 


ing in absolute innocence, and His suffering is the 
absolute ground and cause of our exemption from it, 
or of its ultimate removal. So that the suffering of 


the Redeemer is, in an altogether peculiar way, vicari- 


ous. By merit is meant a product of moral exertion, 


which is of a nature to be an instrument adapted and 


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ROTHE ON THE ATONEMENT. 179 


available to all in the work that devolves on them in 


life as moral beings. The Redeemer by making Him- 
self what He was, the one sufficient instrument of the 


moral renovation of men, and of their recovery from 


sin, created this merit—this sacrament as it may be 
called, universal in its efficacy and value. When 
through Him we receive the forgiveness of our sins, it 
is by means of His merit being reckoned to us, or im- 
puted: that is to say, our sin is forgiven, not because 
there is in ourselves the real possibility and absolute 


warranty of a future complete deliverance from sin, 


_ but because these inhere in the Redeemer; and this 


deliverance is conditioned on our relation to Him. It 


lies in that which He has produced as the means of 
our attaining the end of our being. It isa part of 
Rothe’s conception, that the glorification of Christ, and 
the power which He exerts upon men, as the dispenser 
of influences from above, is the legitimate fruit of that 
spiritual perfection to which He attained in conflict 


- with temptation and through His eelf-surrender in 
death. His personal power continues to be exerted in 


8, vastly augmented degree, in this higher development 


and sphere of His being. 

No theologian has laid more stress than Rothe upon * 
the retroactive bearing of the conflict of Jesus with 
evil—its effect upon Himself. In Rothe this view 
stands connected with a particular theory of the rela- 


HPO FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


tion of matter to spirit, and of the spiritualization 
of matter. But, independently of this speculation, he 
insists upon a truth which the interpreters of the New 
Testament, at the present day, are led more distinctly 
to recognize than it was formerly the habit.to do. Sin- 
less as Christ was from the beginning, the events of His 
career, the victory over temptation, the experience of 
sorrow and of death, did not leave His character un- 
affected. It is characteristic of that great religious 
genius, President Edwards, that He should have 
spoken of the increase of the Saviour’s holiness in 
passing through the scenes that preceded and attended 
the crucifixion. The meaning of His life, as regards 
Himself, and hence in relation to others, is missed, 
unless the reality of His temptation, and of all the 
struggles which the Evangelists record, especially that 


in the Garden, is fully recognized, and unless His | 


character in the maturity of its perfection is looked up- 
on as the product of His own faithful performance, 
amid the circumstances in which He was placed, of 


the work given Him to do. What a burden was — 


rolled off, when He said: ‘It is finished!” 

It will be observed that Rothe, in common with Hd- 
wards, Campbell, Luther, and Schleiermacher, ascribes 
to Jesus a fellow-feeling with sinful men, which carried 
Him out of Himself and caused Him, though without 


the least self-reproach, to take up into His conscious- 


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ROTHE ON THE ATONEMENT. 181 


ness the penal quality which inheres in the ordinance of 
death, and thus to have an intimate knowledge of what 
it is to be punished by God, and to be under His frown. 
The outward inflictions of punishment were there, and 
the inward experience, also, as far as an utterly self- 
devoted sympathy could engender it. 

But Rothe, with Schleiermacher, conceives of guilt 
as the mere shadow of sin, vanishing as sin vanishes, 
and makes the energy of the divine love and righteous- 
ness concentrate upon the breaking of the control of 
sin as a principle, that it may be put on the way to an 
ultimate extinction. The retributive element, the 
divine resentment, “the wrath of God,” demands no- 
thing but a guaranty for the abandonment of sin; 
although it should be said, by way of qualification, that 
God requires the means for working out this result to 
be originated and gathered by the struggle and sacri- 
- fice of the second Adam, on the plane of our human 
life, subject to all its exposures and penal inflictions. 


There are two tendencies which the profoundest 
modern theology in connection with this subject plainly 
discloses. The one is an unwillingness to rest in the 
idea of bare suffering, apart from its particular motives 
and concomitants, as if that alone had an atoning vir- 
tue. It is felt that suffering needlessly incurred, or 


arbitrarily imposed, or not growing naturally out of 


182 - FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


the providential situation in which the Sufferer is 
placed, would not answer the end. The whole effort 
even of Edwards is to show the naturalness of the 
Saviour’s anguish, and of its constituent elements, con- 
sidering what His character and situation were. 

Associated with the tendency just mentioned is the 
disposition to make no point of the guantwm ot sutfer-- 
ing, as if a mathematica! equivalent were to be sought 
for the penalty due to sin. The juridical conception of 
this subject, certainly in this mechanical form, is 
obsolescent. A less objectionable view is suggested in 
the following passage from Canon Mozley : 

“There is, however, undoubtedly contained in the 
Scriptural doctrine of the Atonement, a kind, and a. 
true kind, of fulfilment of justice. It is a fulfilment in 
the sense of appeasing and satisfying Justice; appeas- 
ing that appetite for punishment which is the charac- 
teristic of justice in relation to evil. There is obvious- 
ly an appetite in justice which is implied in that very 
anger which is occasioned by crime, by a wrong being 
committed; we desire the punishment of the criminal 
as a kind of redress, and his punishment undoubtedly 
satisfies a natural craving of our mind. But let any 
‘one have exposed himself thus to the appetite for pun- 
ishment in our nature, and it is undoubtedly the case, 
however we may account for it, that the real suffering 
of another for him, of a good person for a guilty one, 


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MOZLEY ON THE ATONEMENT. en Theey 


will mollify the appetite for punishment, which was 
possibly up to that time in full possession of our minds; 
and this kind of satisfaction to justice, and appeasing 
of it, is involved in the Scriptural doctrine of the Atone- 
ment. And go, also, there is a kind of substitution in- 
volved in the Scripture doctrine of the Atonement, and 
a true kind; but it is not a literal, but a moral kind of 


substitution. It is one person suffering in behalf of 


another, for the sake of another: in that sense he takes 
the place and acts in the stead of another, he suffers 
that another may escape suffering, he condemns him- 
self to a burden that another may be relieved. But 
this is the moral substitution which is inherent in acts 
of love and labor for others; it is a totally different 
thing from the literal substitution of one person for 
another in punishment. The outspoken witness in the 
human heart, which has from the beginning embraced 
the doctrine of the Atonement with the warmth of re- 


_ ligious affection, has been, indeed, a better judge on 


the moral question than particular formal schools of 


~ theological philosophy. The atoning act of the Son, as 


an act of love on behalf of sinful man, appealed to won- 
der and praise: the effect of the act in changing the 
regards of the Father towards the sinner, was only the 
representation, in the sublime and ineffable region of 


mystery, of an effect which men recognized in their 


own minds. The human heart accepts mediation. It 


184 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


does not understand it asa whole; but the fragment of 
which it is conscious is enough to defend the doctrine 
upon the score of morals.” “Justice is a fragment, 
mercy is a fragment, mediation is a fragment; justice, 
mercy, mediation as a reason for mercy—all three; 
what indeed are they but great vistas and openings 
into an invisible world in which is the point of view 
which brings them all together?” * 

_ The Apostle Paul asserts the reconciliation of the 
world to God by the death of Christ (Rom. v. 10; 
compare 2 Cor. v. 19). The Socinian view that 
the removal of man’s feeling of enmity is meant, does 
not accord with the context, and is excluded by the 
soundest interpreters. It is God's relation to the 
world that is changed: a certain relation of hostility 


on His part ceases. How this takes place is, perhaps, - 


not so inexplicable. 

The hostility of God to sin finds an expression in 
- punshment. What is punishment? It is not chas- 
tisement, which is an infliction that looks only to the 
reforming the wrong-doer. Punishment is an infliction 


by a Superior, designed to carry into the consciousness _ 


of the sufferer a conviction of the Superior’s moral 

displeasure at wrong-doing. The immediate motive of 

punishment is self-expression, craved for its own sake 

and for truth’s sake. Resentment is right, and the 
* Mozley’s University Sermons, p. 175-177. 


tn 


THE ATONEMENT. 185 


outpouring of righteous resentment on the head of the 
transgressor may be right. It is the fit and proper 
language of condemnation. 


aes Ng eee, ye 


Christ took on him punishment, as far as he could 


b 


mies 


(being guiltless and consciously approved of God): he 
took on him punishment both external and inward. 
For Christ of his own free will experienced that 


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which is the punishment of sin. That is, he submitted 
willingly to death, and in the exercise of so complete a 
sympathy with the holy God, and with condemned and 
lost man, that he knew and felt what is the wrath of 
God against sin. He felt with God the ill-desert of 
sin; he felt with man what it is to be exposed to a 
just banishment from the light of God’s favor. 

The end of punishment is reached when a full in- 
sight into God’s holy condemnation of sin, and a heart- 
felt sanction of it, are evoked. The desire to punish is 
then sated. 

It is not difficult to see that when Christ thus makes 

himself one with God in the most intimate sense, God 
then and there re-connects himself with estranged 
man. So far as Christ can represent the world otf 
mankind, the world is reconciled to God. The world 
is punished, and is punished effectually. That is to 
say, punishment has done its work upon the conscience 
and will. A true sonship is established in the midst | 


of our race.. 
16* | 


186 FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 


Faith in Christ is the willing recognition of His 
pain of conscience and affliction of spirit on account of 
sin, as being meet for its guilt and unworthiness—as 
alone answering to the measure of our guilt and un- 
worthiness,—and faith is a self-committal to Him as 
- the fountain of a new life of sonship, of perfected love 
to God and man, or sanctification. 

To him who is thus sympathetic with Christ sin is 
graciously forgiven. Forgiveness thus bestowed does 
not lessen his sense of the holiness of God and of his 
own ill-desert. The guasi punishment suffered for our 
benefit on the cross is an expiation, if we recognize it 
as the means whereby man representatively rendered 
to God an adequate tribute of sympathy with his 
righteous displeasure and with the ordinance of penalty 


through which—were justice to be done—it would be_ 


exerted and expressed. Behind and below all is the 
love of God, who spared not his own Son, but through 
Him, lifted upon the cross, entered into communion 
with the race of mankind, estranged and condemned. 
In Christ, the race may be conceived of as returning, 
like the Prodigal, to the Father,—one with Him in 
his retributive sentiment, not less than in the percep- 
tion of His love and mercy. 

The Son of God became man: He took on Him our 
human nature: ‘He condemned sin in the flesh;” 
that is, He adjudged it a usurper, broke its control, 


- 
’ 


¥ 


THE ATONEMENT. 187 


expelled it from the nature which he had taken on, and 


thus became a leaven for the purification of that same 


nature in all who share it with Him. In doing this, 
He did not evade, but submissively carried that nature 
through, the righteous penalties allotted in the moral 
order to sin, thus glorifying God, and appealing only to 
His mercy on behalf of His brethren. So there was a 
reparation in the moral order, violated by our dis- 
loyalty; and that holy feeling of God, coexisting with 
a desire to save, which lies at the root of penal inflic- 
tion, and which man must understand if there is to be 
a reunion of God and man—that feeling which is 


likened to “wrath” in us—was appeased.* 


* To ascribe anger to God is not more anthropomorphic than to 
ascribe to Him compassion. Is it said that anger and love are in- 
compatible? This is so far from being true that an iniquitous child 
moves to anger (as well as to sorrow) even the tenderest parent 
whose moral sense is not blunted: the deepest anger may mingle 
with a yearning love, and stand as a barrier to fellowship. . Nay, it 
is the love that stirs to anger: without this element of righteous 


anger, love is mere good-nature,—void of earnestness, void of all 


ethical quality. 

That in the experiences of death, and of death under the circum- 
stances which brought Him to the cross, Jesus may have gained 
an insight into the holy anger of God, not possible without such an 


- experience, is, to say the least, quite possible. The lament over 


Jerusalem, ending with the words, “ Behold, your house is left unto 
you desolate,”—shows how love mingled in his heart with a sense of 
the deserved condemnation that rested on the objects of that love. 

The gravest difficulties of the subject are avoided when the crude 
commercial conception of the paying of a debt is cast away, and 
with it the scheme of legal weights and balances, and a strained 
literalism in the conception of penalty as borne by Christ. The 
death of Jesus is properly said to be vicarious. It is, moreover, so 
far a substitution that the result of it is to deliver the believer from 
merited punishment. 

It may be added here that if the world is said by the Apostle to 
be reconciled to God, it is to bring out the fact that it is He who 
takes the initiative, and that the whole transaction by which God 
is reconciled to the world—the objective Reconciliation—emanates 


from His own love. 


Vad: 


THE UNITY OF BELIEF AMONG CHRISTIANS. | 


The alleged diversity of belief among Christians, in 
the past ages of the Church and at present, is often 
made an apology for scepticism. The first of the 
causes to which Lord Bacon attributes atheism is 
“ divisions in religion, if they be many.”* Who shall 
determine what the truth is, it is asked, in this chaos 
of opinion? Who shall pronounce upon the meaning 
of the Bible when interpreters are in perpetual discord 
with one another? These questions are founded on a 
mistaken assumption. In the first place, the essential 
religious truth is confounded with the varieties of ex- 
position and philosophy in which it has been formulated 
and defended at different times and in different schools 
of thought. Secondly, upon the fundamental princi- 
ples of the Gospel, the Church has not been thus 
distracted. There has been no such revolution of 
opinion as took place in physical science, when, for ex- 


ample, the Ptolemaic doctrine which made the earth 


* Essays, xvi., of Atheism. 


188 


FAITH AND RATIONALISM. 189 


the centre, the geocentric theory, was supplanted by 
the Copernican which made the sun the centre, the 


heliocentric. Christ has held the central place in the 
Christian system from the beginning until now. His 
Incarnation and Atonement have been continually the 
objects of faith. The primitive church discarded 
alike Ebionism which rejected His divinity, and 
Docetism which rejected His humanity. 

The Nicene theology was the perfecting of a definition, 


not the introduction of a new opinion. That theology 


has been for substance the creed of Greek, Roman 
Catholic, and Protestant, the only exception being sects 
which have professed to dissent from the common 
belief. Various explanations of the Atonement have 


been made. There were early theories which were, in 


some of their details, crude. But even those theories, 
and all others of later date which have obtained a 
lodgment in the Church, have recognized the mediato- 


rial agency of Christ in procuring forgiveness by His 


humiliation and death. As to the main fact of the 


Atonement there has been a general concurrence. The 
controversy of Protestant and Roman Catholic does not 
turn on these cardinal points of doctrine. Both stand for 
the truth declared in the ancient cecumenical creeds. 
Their differences relate to the value of tradition, to the 
constitution and authority of the Church, to the nature 
of the Sacraments, to the way in which the Atonement 


4 


190 ’ UNITY OF CHRISTIAN BELIEF. 


becomes available to the individual—whether by faith 
alone, or by faith and something else—also, to various 
minor particulars of creed and rite, most of which are 
the direct or indirect offshoot of the last mentioned 
difference. But behind these diversities, grave and 
important as they are, there is a common Christianity 
in the profession of which they unite. Here they stand 
_ together, rendering one answer to the question, “‘ What 
think ye of Christ?” It is not to be overlooked that 
debates among Protestants have been largely owing to 
ambiguities of language. One of the most laborious 
disputants of the seventeenth century——that era of 
stormy debate— Richard Baxter, towards the close of 
his life, wrote: “I perceive that most of the Doctrinal 
controversies among Protestants are far more about 
equivocal words than matter.” He adds with affecting - 
candor: “‘ Experience since the year 1643 to this year, 
1675, hath loudly called me to repent of my own 
prejudices, sidings, and censurings of causes and per- 
sons not understood, and of all the miscarriages of 
my ministry and life which have been thereby caused ; 
and to-make it my chief work to call men that are 
within my hearing to more peaceable thoughts, affec- 
tions, and practices.” At an earlier day, Bacon wrote: 
“Tt cannot but open men’s eyes, to see that many 
controversies do merely pertain to that which is either 
not revealed or positive; and that many others do 


UNITY OF CHRISTIAN BELIEF. LOE 


erow upon weak and obscure inferences or derivations: 


- which latter sort, if men would revive the blessed style 


of that great doctor of the Gentiles, would be carried 
thus, Lgo, non Dominus [I, not the Lord], and 
again, Secundum consilvum meum [according to my 


- counsel]; in opinions and counsels, not in positions 


and oppositions.” * 

The most striking sign of that unity of Christians 
which underlies their multiplied discords and differ- 
ences, is in the degree of harmony which exists in acts 
of devotion and in the devotional literature which the 
adherents of diverse communions value in common. 


There are hymns, some of them involving the inmost 


experiences of piety, which are sung by congregations 


of worshippers, in other respects widely at variance. 
A portion of these accepted songs are a product of 
ancient or medieval piety. Hymns composed by op- 
posing theological disputants are cherished in common 
by the Christian communities that profess to follow 
them. The “Imitation of Christ” is one example, but 


the most remarkable example, of the welcome accorded 


to a religious work by Protestant and Catholic alike, 
and by multitudes differing most widely in creed, as 
well as culture. No book except the Bible has been 


F< 50 widely circulated. Yet it enters into the very 


” 


heart of spiritual religion. 


* Of the Advancement of Learning, b. ii. 


